Morris Minor Owners Club

alex_holden wrote:He said they sold two grades of lead acid storage battery - the cheap ones nearly everyone uses are guaranteed for five years, but they also sold more expensive ones that were guaranteed to last twenty years.

The 20 year life ones are those I bought for about 10th of original cost when 2 years old.
They have a date stamped on the casing to confirm when manufactured so seller couldn't fob off older items.

Paul Humphries

Hello Paul,

I am fully aware, (and remember very clearly that the prediction that was made, that we would run out of oil some time long ago) that there is going to be 'crunch' time sometime relatively soon regarding energy.
What I dislike is that there is now an emerging commercial gain to be made from selling apparently 'green' goods or services which at best are only partially so. E.g., a large motor manufacturer who claims that their product is the greenest and we will make a million of them every year. How much greener would it be if they made none?
That is the reality, an ever larger world population and an ever increasing consumer demand for, in many cases, totally unnecessary goods. Throw away and replace is the philosophy.
To me the reality is either largely stop manufacturing and face economic disaster or what? Fiddling about with taxation for small sections of environmentally unpopular sections of the community, be they 4 x 4 owners, airlines etc is, in reality, a sop to public opinion.

Greenpeace et al, prosoper financially by campaigning on such relatively trivial matters.

Alec

Oil will never run out - it will just become more and more expensive. And yes - I remember hearing 30 years ago that the oil would run out in 20 years time. Still seems to be plenty around.
The 'buying green energy' is just nonsense - a way of clearing the conscience by paying a bit more!!
But i would love to have a windmill - anyone got a good link to DIY windmill for power generation?

Heres the definitive site for build your own - all you need to know and more
very addictive though ! You'll turn into a mad professor back shed inventor type before spring

http://www.fieldlines.com/

Oh thats the board - the main site is
http://www.otherpower.com/

Thanks - am already mad prof/back shed etc so no worries there!
But - I don't see anything there telling me how to do it - just trying to sell me a book!!

Hello BMCE,

a friend of my son has a website of his wind generation endevours:- http://www.gotwind.org/new_gen.htm

The biggest problem is, if you want mains voltage A.C. power is finding a generator, then you need to find a way of regulating the speed to give a constant 50 Hertz frequency.
The alternative is to get a D.C. generator and feed an inverter to give regulated A.C.

Alec

Thanks Alec - DC will be fine - would use it to heatwater or perhaps a storage radiator - so no hassles/losses/expense of AC converter!

bmcecosse wrote:Thanks Alec - DC will be fine - would use it to heatwater or perhaps a storage radiator - so no hassles/losses/expense of AC converter!

If you just want to heat water up, how about building a fully mechanical/hydraulic system? Run the turbine driveshaft down to a beater inside an insulated water tank.

Check out the site of Make Magazine- www.makezine.com- and there should be some useful stuff on wind turbines. Try putting "wind turbines" into the search box or something- I know that a few issues ago they had an article that showed you step-by-step how to make an effective wind turbine. Plus they have stories of other people who've made their own, and how they did it. It might help, I hope so!

I think the sound of swishing water would keep 'her indoors' awake at night! The windmill can be at the end of the garden - and the hot water tank is in a cupboard in the house! It already has an unused immersion heater - so all that needs is free lecetricity!!

I heat my water by solar. Tonight I will lay back in a deep bath of free hotwater. it even feels better being heated by sunlight!

I've just been and checked still 60 degrees C at the panels and its 5 pm 4 hours past noon.

Sadly - the sun doesn't shine all that well up here - but I agree, solar is the way to go! How do you stop it freezing in the winter?

But - I don't see anything there telling me how to do it - just trying to sell me a book!!

http://www.otherpower.com/otherpower_experiments.html

Its all there from the links on the index page - just got to dig around a bit

Ahh - right oh. Save that for a rainy day read then. Hmm - that's the rain back on again, so here goes!

Hello Roger,

"free hotwater", in energy costs, maybe? But what does the panel, installation and possibly a circulation system cost?
I'm not saying that it is a bad idea and is very common in the Middle East (certainly a far higher grade of energy source there), but the mindset is that all that is taken into account is the energy cost, which, if you read my earlier post on wind power, is just a part of the total cost.

Alec

Hello BMCE,

if all you want is pure resistive load then the frequency is not so relevant with regard to an A\C generator, and they will be more available in the larger sizes that heating may require. (And of course the voltage will be suitable)

Alec

Its an indirect system and the solar loop is filled with antifreeze.
I have a tall tank about 3 times the capacity of a normal one the Oil burner heats the top half in the winter and the solar coil is at the bottom so heats the whole tank. Sometimes in June we get 90 degrees plus inthe tank. The pump turns off at 96 to stop it boiling. Obviously we have a mixer so it comes out of the taps at 60 degrees.

I installed it myself and it cost about £1500 over the last 6 years I have used about 6000litre less than my nextdoor neighbour so it paid for itself in about 4 years I calculate. So now it really is free hot water!

so whats this got to do with a gearbox

All the rain you have up there, how about a hydro plant? Water flowing out of a barrel through a pipe with a wheel...