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Rod Read

15a Aiginis
Isle of Lewis
HS2 0PB

07899057227
01851 870878

Dear Airborne Wind Energy group
I'm one of the guys worked on "Sky Domes".I'd like to mention that we are proud to have your attention. thank you so much for your welcome.
your message make us more hopeful to the future and also the competition.
best regards
Pouyan Bizet, Head chief at the zero atelier.

In order to make the ring infrastructure lighter.... You can run on one single circular I section rail. Each cart on the rail can just ride the rail e.g. be non generating. Kite control being done at altitude. Tie the carts tightly together around the ring. Now tie each cart to a central generating carousel / hub.
The control algorythms for the kites wouldn't be simple since the kite tethers all go round at the same speed no matter the aspect... but I'm sure it's do-able.

We are all still working out how to best semantically express novel but basic AWE ideas for the purposes of science, engineering, and FARs (FAA/ICAO aviation regulations). A sound complete nomenclature will ease communication and prevent misunderstanding. 

Standard terms are perhaps most lacking in the MegaScale AWES concept space. A major divide in megascale dense-arrays is between kites that are not crosslinked aloft, and those that are. Hence, some new wording proposals-
 

1) Let dense arrays of kite elements aloft be known as "flocks".  

2) Lets call non-crosslinked cases "swarms". 

3) Lets dub crosslinked cases "teams". 

     Usage- "A Spider-Mill is an AWES flock concept intermediate between a swarm and a team."

4) Lets also define "gang" as synonymous with "flock", especially in reference to a "gangline". 

     Usage- "A Spider-Mill has kites on leaders set along a main gangline."

5) Let "dense" in this context be defined as "flying in close formation or proximity".

6) "Array" is a common term, but lets formally define it as any aggregation of kite elements, including entire kite farms.


Note: A pending MegaScale AWES Concepts Report and TACO Updates will follow the proposed new conventions. Feel free to suggest improvements.

A "mechanical diode" is a one-way drive like a sprag, clutch, or ratchet. Used with a spring return, or opposed, they can be well-suited to convert kite tug cycles into rotary power. Such an AWES can be a single tiny unit, but the potential exists for large arrays of semi-chaotic kite elements to collectively drive common shafting well into gigawatt scale. 


Progress continues in mechanical drives. This one-way drive innovation comes from from auto racing; Epilogic's Mechanical Diode (TM)-

http://www.epilogics.com/md/index.htm%c2%a0


Check out the entire site for excellent background information.

The AWES idea here is that reciprocating and geared power can win the race if its shown to be far cheaper and more practical than any direct-rotary design (like most cars). 

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=no-limit-for-wind-power

I don't think I'll bother to read this one - I'm sure I already know what's in it... I remember contacting Sci-Am about SuperTurbine(R) when it was first patented, and I couldn't find anyone the LEAST bit interested. That was when I realized the pundits and authorities we rely on for our facts are often completely clueless.

Here's what I don't get:
Seems like I spend my whole life waiting for "science" to catch up with what I already knew as a little kid. Like when I was told nobody knew what the appendix was for and said "maybe it's there to keep a starter culture of beneficial bacteria alive." Decades later of course, the "scientists" figure out what has been staring them in the face the whole time.

Or how 'bout when "scientists" said life was restricted to Earth, whereas I thought there should be life throughout the universe, and waited decades for the "scientists" to even propose what I already knew. I wondered, why do they call me a little kid, and they call scientists scientists, if, as a little kid, I can tell you what the scientists will say in 40 years?

Really, we have enough wind to power civilization? This is news, again? Like any idiot can't see, with the vast and open skies, that there's some major wind energy up there to harvest? Gee ya think?

This reminds me of a primitive village trying to figure out how to cross a river, and they need a witch doctor to show up in a special costume, to do a special dance, a dance that tells the story of the river - that the river has water in it, then the villagers point out that, technically-speaking, one can float in water...

They know things float in water - they've seen objects float by. They know wood floats, and they know how to build things out of wood. One kid makes little model boats and watches them float away just for fun but nobody notices.

Year after year the villagers get together and their witch doctor does the special dance again, celebrating the fact that the river has water in it.

The one kid wonders why the villagers need the witch doctor to tell the story of the river again - can't they plainly see the river is full of water without a witch doctor to verify such a simple fact by doing a special dance, in a special costume?

Especially interesting is the phenomenon of the celebrated uber-witch-doctor that travels from village to village, always confirming the existence of rivers filled with water, expressing the new theme, dictated from even higher uber-witch-doctors, that it would benefit all tribes to be able to get across these rivers.

The very highest uber-witch doctors don't actually know how to DO anything, they are just very very good at "casting spells", a skill by which the primitive villagers are most impressed, and which they value above all other skills...

Well, it will be interesting to watch the increasing number of villagers who suddenly see the obvious, the river, yet can't figure out what to do with it.

How much longer will people go on pretending its hard to figure out?
:)
Doug Selsam
Maboomba!

Robert,

Regarding your specific doubt whether "a fabric wing [AWES] with a large enough Coefficient of Lift can also achieve very low CL's during retraction without becoming unstable".

Note that soft wings have a natural capacity for Variable Geometry. They pack away to a hundredth or so of their deployed volume. Many methods exist for retracting large soft kites by furling or depowering, and they do vary in merit, but stability is doable. A logical proof- 

       Posit a jumbo jet sized glider of 50 tons with a payload capacity of 100 tons. Its stable in a glide and can carry 100 tons of packed soft wing, which wing in turn, fully deployed, can lift and/or pull about 1000 tons. The jumbo aircraft can perform a stable low Cl retraction by gliding down with a packed mega kite. So this is really an operational engineering problem worth study, rather than an intrinsic scaling barrier identified by scaling and control laws.

Operations of large aerospace and military decellerators and parafoils has already amply shown basic proof-of-concept. Your pessimism about soft wings presumes not just that human ingenuity cannot design a highly optimal practical packing/deployment cycle, but also that only downwinding AWES cycles are workable,. Of course, a giant soft wing can fly stably back and forth crosswind, indefinitely, by wind or pumping, with no need to fold or pack for an upwind return cycle. This is a superior power cycle over "reeling", and can be done many ways.

We are left with the fact that historic kites outscale any rigid-winged aircraft ever built. While rigid airframes are not soon going to grow much larger, the modern fabric kite has only just begun to scale. These are scaling-law predictions. As for control, the ultimate stability basis will come from staking-out megascale kite networks from spread anchors. Near Zero neglected the great potential of these architectural possibilities.

Thanks for resonding to this topic,

dave santos
Kitelab Group

PS Robert, you also wrote- "If you have a bridling scheme/control cycle which can achieve those goals, and have achieved reliable, continuous, autonomous net power production with a fabric wing, I would love to see it."

Perhaps you simply overlooked the last few years of progress in basic AWES practice and theory, especially the most advanced megascale concepts, given WindLift's great focus on fielding small remotely based AWES. A lot of the new work has shown "reliable, continuous, autonomous net power production with a fabric wing", but mostly at "toy" scale-
--------------------------------
KiteLab Group
www.kitelabgroup.com/Testing these methods led KiteLab Group to an Airborne Latticework concept validated in numerous scale-prototype experiments. Dense-arrays mitigated ...
--------------------------------
However, some key elements are already huge, and just getting bigger-
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Mega Kite shakes off hundreds of pounds of sand ...
youtube.comSep 3, 2012 - 40 sec - Uploaded by UtilMovement
Here's MOTHRA1 shaking off hundreds of pounds of sand in ~20mph winds! Note how easily it is brought ...
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Near Zero may have missed the boat on AWES Megascaling by promoting WindLift's view on the topic, rather than understanding those working in that area.

More primitive Witch Doctors - not needed - irrelevant.

Congratulations and good luck!
:)

Attachments :

static multirotor flygen without text.JPG

A static AWES scheme comprising a Selsam's Superturbine (tm) where generator is not at ground:a little less advantages but feasible.

 

PierreB

http://flygenkite.com  

NearZero Understanding
NearZero Creativity
NearZero Solutions
NearZero Relevance
NearZero Targeting of even a promising direction...
NearZero - period.
:)
To Dave S.: "Go Fly a Kite!"

The efficiency of this setup can be increased greatly by putting U-joints in the turbine hubs, to allow the blades to maintain the correct angle of attack.  

BobS,

 

Nothing is obvious for me,and I did not think to U-joints which look to be a solution for a long global shaft where each section has a different angle.For short shaft and 3 or 4 rotors,a rigid shaft can perhaps be enough.

 

PierreB 

Just look carefully at a picture of a turbine, and see how the angle of attack changes continuously if it is not normal to the wind.  I got sensitized to this when a human-powered boat went faster than the theoretical prop pitch would let it go, due to the prop shaft angle.  Other experimenters found that they could eliminate the support bearing near the prop, and use a somewhat flexible shaft.  The prop forces would actually keep the shaft bent as if there was a bearing at the end to keep the prop square to the flow.

Advantadges of high-scale AWE are more pregnant farshore where winds are
more powerful,where sea use is not a big problem,where conventional
turbines can not be implemented, because both lever force on tower,and
deepless of water,that must content with being settled offshore with the
environmental and visual impacts.

PierreB

Like-autogiro mode (Sky windpower,Windmill,some Superturbine,perhaps WheelWind) is seen as a good possibility for AWES.But profiles of blades are quite different for wind turbine and for autogiro.So is it really possible to obtain a good compromise?

PierreB

http://flygenkite.com

Pierre,

You are right that autogiro blades are very different from conventional wind turbine blades. Since they operate at an inclined flight angle compared to HAWT rotors, they are commonly hinged at the hub so that the AoA (angle of attack) varies with phase. This passive form of "cyclic pitch" is a refinement some inclined wind designs like Doug's omit. 

Autiogiro blades and rotors are built lighter for flight than those of pure wind turbines. Frequent inspection and shorter lifecycles are used. For AWE, we are developing special super-light "floaty" rotors (Skymill, Sky WindPower, UMaryland and UTexas).

The major mismatch in blade/rotor design is in AWES is dual-mode motoring and generating. To both autogyro and motor requires a variable pitch hub for "collective pitch" control. The blades must passively twist for proper helical pitch.

To generate as a wing mounted HAWT, and also motor, tends to require a symmetrical blade foil section, although the designer can favor one mode over the other. The helical pitch of the blades can be set into the structure.

So, to answer your question, there is no ideal compromise, but careful design can minimize the inherent challenges and make good working rotors,

daveS

Note: the flygen turbine concept you showed us needs some sort of vane or pendulum mass on the generator to oppose the torque from the wind rotor.

Airborne Wind Energy: Huge Potential — And Hurdles
Yale Environment 360
PJ Shepard, co-founder of an industry group called the Airborne Wind Energy Consortium, says the progress toward working, power-generating prototypes has ... 

Pierre:
There you go!
The possibilities for Superturbine(R), and many other basic ideas, are almost unlimited, and as you point out, the flygen/groundgen paradigm suggests a lot of options somewhere in between.
Yes the flygen/groundgen question seems like a basic question today. In the future it may seem like the question of whether the guy with the lantern ahead of the car could optionally ride a horse.
:)
Doug S.

What has increasingly dawned on me is that kite technology itself, is like 2000 years behind the times... OMG!

What my question is concerning the carousel turning generators is efficiency. I'm assuming a larger track would be less efficient because it would take longer to turn the carousel 1 revolution. It is for that reason I wanted to have an axle driven generator. At least you would get a constant power output. Also, with axle driven generators a straight track would be great because you could ride the carts back and forth. It would be ideal to lay a couple straight tracks down in different directions and put the carts on the track that is best suited for the wind direction. What I would really like to do is try to find a way to install a small generator to a kite buggy. From there I could plug in some figures to give theoretical power output from the kite size and swept area and wind speed. If any test like this has been done please share. It sounds like a good project I could try to get funding for on kickstarter if it hasn't been done.

There should be suitable hardware in electric bike kits or golf carts.  Even if they are not switched for regenerative braking, they are easy to set one way or the other.

1. Dave Culp noted to me that some kite buggy was wheel-driving an electric generator.  Ask him. 

Article LINK:  http://e360.yale.edu/feature/high_altitude_wind_energy_huge_potential_and_hurdles/2576/ 

Well, the oil industry is doing pretty well with huge continuing subsidies.  Maybe we should ask for a level playing field, at least.

Not only,KiteGen,Selsam's (with a comment about low efficiency of Magenn),and others.

 

PierreB

Hi

I would be glad to hear how the projects proceed. I will comment if I think it can be of value.
 I am cc:ing to professor Joachim Grenestedt, Swede, who is in the "wind business" in the US.

Cheers

Anders

Hey Dave S.
I know my patents are long and take a while to read, but my designs do not omit such refinements. Sure, deny everything I've come up with over 4 decades, then try to claim that you thought it all up in the first place...
Sounds about right.
You don't suppose that my patents tell us how to do AWE, do you?
I think you should stick with your predicted kite-puller oscillating quantum waves. Keep working on that new physics. I think you're almost there...
Doug S.

How much government funding would it take to build a model airplane?
Seems like government funding can make it profitable to pretend that easy things are hard.
Just like unemployment makes it easy for people to say "Yeah I could sort of use a little time off anyway..."
"fill out this form for each employer you have contacted".
Oh good another check as long as I don't find a job...
or
another check as long as AWE remains impossible, inadvisable, impractical, etc.

I know that for AWE, L/D is more an input than a key to maximizing
economic performance, but I am curious about the performance
possibilities our experts forsee in fabric wing design. So far, I
found a reference to a paraglider getting 6.5:1

TIA,
Bob Stuart

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