I did not understand your written description.  I just saw the word "cam" which I interpreted as rotation, and you cited a kite arch, anchored at each end, which prevents aiming, though people keep citing a large, circular track as a cure for that.  That track sounds like an economic disaster.  I suggested a regular kite instead, like say a parafoil, to preserve the ability to passively respond to changing wind direction.  Not sure about the cam thing, but my thought was if you have a pulling force, using that pulling force.  By the time you are translating the pulling force to rotation, it seems you may fall back into flywheels and a gearbox, turning a generator.  At some point you might as well just use a regular farm windmill, a design proven for 150 years.
The economics of the market-leading best-quality small electric turbines today is such that the electricity they generate can never pay for the turbine, never pay for the property taxes if taxed, and never pay for maintenance, let alone all three.  Still, if you love wind energy, you just like having them run.  The most economical use is off-grid where no power is available, but solar is getting so cheap it's hard to beat.  Solar panels are not beaten to death at 120 mph all day.  They don't require hiring a crane to service.  They just sit there and (boring) do their job. 

AWES on Kepler-186f   ?   Time will tell ....

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Sorry you are wrong again.  (But thanks for saying "Doug is wrong" again)
This message is in fact powered by a SuperTurbine(R).  But you just wrote: " There is no ST operating regularly at any scale anywhere in the world", so clearly it is YOU who are wrong.
It's right outside, spinning for years, as a matter of fact.  Others are in use every day, helping to power peoples' homes.  They have steel driveshafts.  Then you said: "no progress reported for several years".  Wrong again, ace.  While the leading manufacturer of small wind turbines, Southwest Windpower, went bankrupt (finally bit the dust last year) after taking in $80 million in funding, without ever having a reliable product developed, we were diligently working out the details of getting SuperTurbine(R) to survive on the exact towers where turbines from Southwest had failed.  Their failures were our opportunity to do better while taking advantage of existing  infrastructure.  Now we have a model that spins forever andnever fails (well of course it can't go forever, but we have not had a failure in years now)  I was out last night in a good wind, watching one spin, and I had a moment of amazement of the quiet, steady-state, motion that made a machine with working parts moving 120 mph look like it was standing still.  People without long experience in wind energy have no idea of the significance of developing a turbine that is even reliable, let alone more powerful for the diameter.  It may be the best model of its size ever.  But there is no point in mentioning any of that to people who know basically nothing about wind energy.   That is like throwing pearsl before swine - they can't even engage in the conversation, let alone make a meaningful contribution, or appreciate any salient fact.  There's no point in having a conversation about wind energy with people who only call names and attempt to agitate, while never producing any machine that delivers a usable amount of energy.  Typically they are amazed when they can show that anything they made can spin for more than a few minutes.  In your case, it is what, an hour-and-a-half, producing no usable energy, right?  So what?  Show us some power.  Pump up that tire.  Or use a pneumatic motor to drive a generator from your tank.   We know why you don't.  because you can't.  Easier for you to find fault with proven ideas that work all-day, every day, like SuperTurbine(R).
All wind turbines must deal with cubic scaling laws.  The main purpose of SuperTurbine(R) has been to address those cubic scaling laws.  Smaller rotors sweep more area for less mass, and spin faster, requiring less gearing, no gearing, and/or a smaller PM alternator.  The ideas, as published, offer many other aspects that address scaling.  There is a process in place to develop the technology and I don't feel the need to re-explore all of the aspects here, just to answer your nebulous negative statements, which would get repetitive.  My take has been "build-it and demo it or shut up" which is why I had the only working demo at the first AWE conference, that had already won Popular Science Invention of the year in June 2008, in which issue SuperTurbine(R) and me were the centerfold.  Previously I had only dated centerfolds.  Those were the days!  Last weekend I had a friend whose band was on tour playing the Roxy in Hollywood on the Sunset Strip.  Only a little over an hour away from here.  It made me homesick for the big city.  No wind down there, but a lot of fun.  :)

Uh yeah Roddy, I hear you.  Mixing the layers of the ocean is an intriguing idea, but also may have unintended side effects.  But here's what I see, over and over again:
Any decent idea is automatically self-sabotaged.  If someone suggests a million existing wells that could use a cheap way to pull up the water, the answer is circular tracks and mixing the ocean.  This is what I call the Dr. Seuss syndrome, way easier than finding such a well and using a kite to get water.  That will never happen because all the "smart people" would rather talk about powering lasers on other planets than actually building anything that works.  See, as long as you are in the land of the hypothetical, you can pretend to be a genius.  It's when you have to create something useful in any way, that actually works, that you are humbled by mother nature, and realize that only hard work will get you there, while internet bluster is mostly a distraction.

Nice try Dave S., but I could find a better use for 500 bucks - I already sent a free and super-easy idea for you to show how much power you are making, running a foot-operated tire pump.  No extra equipment needed besides a ruler or yardstick, a car with tires, and taking a video.  Of course, actual power output is the last thing you want to know, or have anyone else see.  Have fun.  :)

I see no evidence of anyone pumping water using kites in Namibia.  Or anywhere else.  Do you have a link?  (We know the answer)  You said "WPI seems on track to be the first to operate kite-pumped water wells in Namibia."  Keyword "seems".  Does it "seem" that way to you?  Really?    Should we place a bet on that?  Can you say "gullible"?  What do you think the actual chances are that WPI will ever pump a useful amount of water in Namibia using a kite?  I can tell you the actual chances.  And you know the answer.  Another "press-release breakthrough", announced just slightly before it actually "breaks through" anything.  Promises, promises.  Joe should archive what percentage of such press-release breakthroughs actually manifest as reality, and he might soon find "The Professor Crackpot Syndrome" is not only real, it dominates, and there are very few exceptions.  I quickly Googled the topic and see promises from 2008 to first operate one in Rutland, then Namibia.  I've mentioned, one more syndrome, one more way to confuse any issue, is, before one has a working system at all, they are already obfuscating the issue by throwing in the names of obscure places with little or no industrial development.  Just when an observer is about to ask exactly how well it works, they are handed a guilt-trip envisioning people in some undeveloped place with no electricty.  The real idea is to keep changing the subject and interjecting emotional content so as to delay having to face, let alone solve, the technical issues.  This all takes subconsciously.  The idea seems to be that if a system is unworkable here, and if rich people can't afford it, taking the idea on a safari will magically solve all the technical issues and result in a working solution.  What I saw was an idea for generating electricity using intermittent kite-pulling to actuate a lever arm that is used to spin a generator.  How is it working today?  Any news on that?  Or have they moved on to the next press-release?  Are they generating as much power as your foot-powered bicycle pump?

Hi Roddy:  Google "sucker rod" "Windmill" and maybe "water" "pumping", and you will find ample explanations of how they work.  Lots of diagrams and explanations.  It is often cited that the basic design has not changed in 150 years.  It may also be that some modification of the basic setup, such as a longer stroke, might make it more amenable to kite-pulling.  Millions of these wind-powered wells are all around the world.  The cost per gallon pumped can be broken down according to the cost of drilling the well and dropping in and caulking with concrete the casing and pump, the cost of the tower and windmill with its associated gearbox and long sucker rod, the cost of installation, then the cost of maintenance over time, and whatever cost might be associated with operating the pump, which would be much higher if it involves constant onsite human intervention.  The wells are proven.  The windwheels on relatively short towers that drive them are similarly proven, and can run unattended for years.  What remains is to improve on these windwheels on towers.  Can it be done?  Nobody knows for sure until someone actually does it!

Dave S. please stop changing the subject.  I asked what you think the chances WPI will usefully pump water in Namibia.  I can pretty much guarantee the answer.  Your response, as usual, reads like some sort of Nostradamus-inspired threat.  Try answering the exact question.  I prefer to stick to simple facts, one at a time, that can be proven, not endless posturing and threats.  Let me know when you can show me WPI pumping water in Namibia using kites.  No I would not enter into a bet with you because you would always find a way to change the subject and avoid admitting you lost the bet, let alone pay  up.  Give me a break - I have to "consider the source".  For the same reason, you can't get anyone who knows anything to "debate" you.  What would be the point?  You can't stick to a topic or answer even one simple question.  You avoid facts like you are allergic to them.  I will tell you the answer to whether the folks at WPI will have a useful kite-powered water-pumping system in Namibia: ZERO.  Can you understand the concept of ZERO?  Can you understand the concept of endless LIES?  Lie after lie after lie?  The chances are ZERO because if they had something that worked, they'd do it in their own backyard to start, and you would have heard about it.  Naming far-off places that most people could not find on a map will not save them.  It is a delaying tactic, and even they are not aware of the fact that they have long ago fell into a well-worn syndrome.  Please stop characterizing ME as some sort of skeptic when I maintain that it is possible to pump water using a kiyte and in fact advocated doing so.,  Yes it is possible.  No, nobody is doing it.  Go ahead and send my 500 bucks.

You are correct Roddy: On the real wind energy yahoo group, we recently lost a member hailing from Texas, with about 30 years of wind energy experience in Columbia (South America).  He was an electrical engineer.  The stories of the things they made work, including pumping water, were phenomenal.  (If I remember he used electric pumps).  His narrative boggled the mind.  He had so many tricks up his sleeve, so many success stories of McGuyvering wind energy in a third-world type environment, it was truly amazing.  He also offered to come out to California and help with the California Energy Commission-sponsored SuperTurbine(R) project at no charge, insisting he could add MPPT electronics to improve the output .  I kept telling him he should write a book, but, unfortunately, he passed away a few months ago.

I'm sorry if you find it offensive when someone knows what they are talking about.

I will look up sucker rod thanks Doug, but I'm afraid I'll find a picture of me with a straw.
You must forgive my ignorance, water really isn't short on the ground here.
I was once involved in drilling a water well in the Sahara... Should also have remembered my high school geography how water was lifted from the Nile.

Roderick Read
15a Aiginish
Isle of Lewis
HS2 0PB
kitepowercoop.org

K: {W1, T, W2}.   When W1 elements are intended not to move relative to the media that embeds the W1 elements, then we have a fixed-anchor kite system; for such explore anchors.  Of course we also have kite systems with an anchor system that moves: railed carts, trolleys, cars, trucks, trains, kiteboard, boat, ... 

Yes, Rod, ploughing occurs at the soil foil end of a soil kite system. Yet traditional soil ploughing need not be the limit of soil kiting.   Some land-kiters are "ploughing" the sands with their feet, shoes, and land boards with their soil-kite systems. 

Hunting for meteorites.
Cutting peats.
Cutting channels in ice.
Pinging geological surveys.

Roderick Read
15a Aiginish
Isle of Lewis
HS2 0PB
kitepowercoop.org

The article did shy away from having kytoons be kite systems and did shy away from having AWTs from being the kite systems that they are. 

Steffen Born

http://www.energykitesystems.net/KitePatents/US/US291691/index.html 

In case WPI has something for this topic: 

Thank you Roddy.  I am honored that you would place my name on your video.  I'm still thinking, though, that there is some very simple solution out there just waiting to be discovered, that would use a simple up and down motion of a kite directly coupled to a simple up and down motion of a pump.  What you've drawn assumes you already have brought rotation down to ground level, in which case, the existing drive mechanism already in use on the 150-year-old farm windmill could be utilized.  But what you don't show is a way to translate the pumping motion of a kite to that rotation at ground level in the first place, which would be the key missing link.  My thought is, eliminate the "middle man" of rotation(?).  Maybe it is not needed.  To me, bringing rotation is a challenge that could be bypassed for the great need of providing a water supply, by utilizing a pumping motion of a kite, to drive an up-and-down pumping pump, for pumping water.  I get the impression that the kite people have easy ways to get a kite to "pump" (or pick your descriptive word).  If a more economical way of pumping water is developed, whether kite-based or not, it would find a wide demand across the world, not dependent on any particular location, or so I believe.

I saw the first one but did not understand it.  Probably due to my cranial density.

Concerning FlygenKite my answer is no. Is it different for Doug's ground-based or flexible AWE SuperTurbine(R); Rod's disk (kites arround a ring); DaveS's tripod with short strokes or a turbine fixed on a tether of a lifting kite; DaveL's reeling gyrocopter; JoeF's lever systems, and others?

Perhaps a real open and collaborative realization can exist with the forum as making pumping water kite.

 

PierreB 

Questions to RodR, DougS, DaveS, DaveL, JoeF and others: does the forum help you to realize your prototypes? Concerning FlygenKite my answer actually is no. Is it different for ground-based or flexible AWE SuperTurbine(R), Rod's disk (soft kites arround a ring), DaveS's turbine on single line of static kite, or tripod short strokes, DaveL's reeling gyrocopter, JoeF's lever systems?

PierreB

Yes, the AWES forum helps me realize some prototypes.