Project Testing

For testing of procedures and equipment, data was measured by using Dr. Kipple's Electric Drives equipment, shown in Our Proposal, with dSPACE ControlDesk software to control the permanent-magnet DC (PMDC) motor and MATLAB software to produce desired plots.

To do more in-depth testing, and get a better idea of how our turbine will function in the real world, we were able to gain access to a wind tunnel in Flagstaff. Usning this wind tunnel, we tested our system with and without a gearbox, up and down wind, and with different electrical component setups: open-circuit, loaded, and DC grid output.

From these tests, we gained a lot of data, and were faced with more design challenges, as mentioned elsewhere: we needed higher RPMs to get a usable voltage output, out rectifier has too high of a voltage drop, we need the current blades to get a good cut-in, but need different blades to get higher RPMs, we are unable to use a gearbox due to the amount of torque required to turn the motor, etc.

Here is a picture down the wind tunnel with the turbine on its mount:

Wind Tunnel