| REUK Shop | REUK Blog | Directory | About Us  |  | RSS Web Feed for Renewable Energy UK 

PVC Wind Turbine Blades



PVC Wind Turbine Blades

Learn how to make your own PVC wind turbine blades

wind
  Printer Friendly Version Print Article     

PVC Wind Turbine Blades are becoming more and more common for homemade domestic wind turbines. The raw material, PVC pipe, is easy to find, relatively cheap, easy to work with, and performance is more than acceptable for a small basic wind turbine generator. PVC wind turbine blades can simply be bolted onto a Permanent Magnet Alternator or suitable Stepper Motor and you already have a basic wind turbine.

One of the most difficult parts of making your own wind turbine is producing suitable blades. Wind turbine blades go through enormous stresses and must be made to quite tight tolerances if they are to balance and not send destructive vibrations through your wind turbine.

Typically blades are carved from wood, but this is very time consuming, difficult, and requires a wide range of tools (saws, drills, sanders, clamps, work bench etc). (Click here to find out more about Making Wooden Wind Turbine Blades). Fortunately there is an alternative: PVC (or ABS) pipe cut to size. Best of all, if your wind turbine generator is damaged in a storm it is very cheap and quick to put together another set of turbine blades.

In strong winds the flexibility of the PVC blades is useful as it takes some of the energy out of the wind preventing the wind turbine generator from spinning too quickly and being damaged. Obviously you need to take care to ensure that the blades cannot bend back far enough to hit the wind turbine mast.

Individual wind turbine blades can be cut out of the pipe using a jigsaw or hacksaw blade, or a one piece pair of blades can be made.
Below is an example design of a one piece (two blade) PVC wind turbine propellor.
This design may not be the optimal configuration. Jeremy Parsons suggests that the trailing edge needs to be moved away from the pipe centreline to improve the amount of lift (and therefore rotation) generated by the aerofoil. Take a look at his site to see a diagram of the new design together with the logic behind it.

PVC Wind Turbine Blade Design

If you prefer to make three or more individual wind turbine blades then you need to create a hub to sit at the centre onto which the wind turbine blades can be attached. Blades can be screwed or bolted to a hub made from plywood or, for larger blades, a metal radiator fan from a car can be used with each of your PVC blades screwed onto a fan blades. The blades themselves can be most easily made by quartering the PVC pipe along its length, and making one turbine blade from each quarter.

We now have a selection of photographs of PVC wind turbine blades.



Article Last Modified: 15:16, 19th Aug 2008

Comment on this Article

If you have any comments on this article, please email them to neil@reuk.co.uk.


Related REUK Categories

wind
© 2006-2013 REUK - All Rights Reserved
Page Last Updated on 19th June 2013 at 12:28:19pm

Recent
Blog Posts


1.Bricking a Beaglebone Black

2.Project of the Day – 12V High Power Regulator with LT1084CP-12

3.Raspberry Pi Temperature Datalogger with DS18B20 Sensor

4.New Raspberry Pi Category on REUK.co.uk Website

5.Special Offer of the Day – 20W PV Solar Panel £25.99

6.Reducing Reflectivity of PV Solar Panels to Increase Efficiency

7.Low Voltage Disconnect with Display and Datalogger

8.Saudi Solar Power Boom About to Begin

9.Compressed Air for Storage of Renewable Energy

10.Offer of the Day – 80W Monocrystalline Solar Panel £71.98


Latest
Articles


Wire 5V Direct to Raspberry Pi
Find out how to connect 5V directly to Raspberry Pi instead of using micro USB
raspberry pi
12:28, 19th Jun 2013

Solar Powered Raspberry Pi
Power your Raspberry Pi permanently from a PV solar panel
raspberry pi
20:42, 17th Jun 2013

Beaglebone Black Credit Card Sized Computer
Find out about the Beaglebone Black - tiny, low cost, low power use computer
raspberry pi
15:46, 14th Jun 2013

Power over Ethernet
Find out how to power your networked microcontroller projects directly via the ethernet cable
electronics
17:04, 13th Jun 2013

Raspberry Pi Temperature Logger with Xively
Make a Raspberry Pi temperature data logger accessible online with Xively
raspberry pi
20:44, 12th Jun 2013

DS18B20 Temperature Sensor with Raspberry Pi
Measure temperatures with a 1-wire DS18B20 sensor and Raspberry Pi
raspberry pi
20:37, 12th Jun 2013

Simple Raspberry Pi Relay Control over the Internet
Take your first steps in Raspberry Pi home automation - controlling a relay
raspberry pi
15:57, 6th Jun 2013

Raspberry Pi Flashing LED with GPIO and Python
Find out how to set up Raspberry Pi to flash an external LED using GPIO
raspberry pi
15:57, 6th Jun 2013



REUK Shop

Popular Items


REUK SUPER LDR DUSK DAWN RELAY CONTROLLER
Multi-function light detector triggered light/dark dawn/dusk relay controller
£19.95 each.
Complete Circuits



KARASOULI SCC 20 CHARGE CONTROLLER
20A rated wind turbine charge controller and dump load controller with blocking diode and heatsink
£43.95 each.
Renewable Energy System Parts



2013 SOLAR PUMP CONTROLLER WITH RELAY
New solar water heating pump controller with fitted 10A relay
£25.99 each.
Complete Circuits



REUK SUPER POULTRY LIGHTING CONTROLLER
Control up to 8 Watts of LED spotlights to stimulate egg production in birds
£29.99 each.
Complete Circuits



REUK SUPER TIMER 2
User programmable 12VDC powered 16A rated repeating relay timer. 1 second to 99 hours ON and OFF times
£23.99 each.
Complete Circuits



300 WATT POWER INVERTER
Convert 12V DC battery power into 230 AC to power portable televisions, computers, video recorders etc. 300 Watt power rating - peak power 600 Watts
£29.99 each.
Renewable Energy System Parts



CONVERTED PROGRAMMABLE DIGITAL TIMER RELAY
Mains powered programmable timer converted to low voltage with relay board
£21.99 each.
Renewable Energy System Parts



12 VOLT REGULATOR
Supply a fixed 12.0 Volt DC to your devices (up to 0.7 Amp output)
£4.79 each.
Complete Circuits



MR16 CERAMIC BULB HOLDER
Bulb holder for 12 Volt LED spotlight bulbs
£1.39 each.
Energy Efficient Lighting