Weekly Equipment Update and Q&A September 25, 2023

[@kimmogensen5390]

the Q&A is very good content and a easy way to share your wealth of knowlegde....proceed my desertbound dude.....

[@calmauric8218]

Im about to buy a air speed i500 with carbon blades. Will be charging a 400ah lithium bank.. Going to experiment with a victron smart mppt to safely charge the bank and manage a dump load

[@nhikoid]

Looking forward to a windy winter!

[@nhikoid]

For lower wind areas, running into a lower voltage battery bank will probably increase yield by lowering the cut in speed. I run my turbines ( both 24v ) into a 12v bank. Made a surprising difference to overall yield.

[@Deiphobuzz]

Would be better to use the cap mod.

[@boringsoftware2093]

VERY VALUABLE INFO THANKS! got 2x question: 1) what is ur favorite wind turbine model? :D which wind turbine is working reliable long term? (rain? bearing of good quality? break actually works?) 2) how to best combine solar + wind? :D (should go on the same 48V LiFePo4 battery) (never thought that 3 blades spin faster than 5 but of course, 5 = more mass = slower to start turning)

[@ToysforWatts]

1. The best performing turbine I have is the iSta Breeze Heli 2.0. It easily produces twice the power as my i2000 at any given time. Been a great performer and I've only had issues with the slip ring. The i1500 and i2000 are easily the best watt per dollar turbines on the market, though. I've only compared them directly against a few no name chinese turbines and some missouri wind models and if I had to buy a turbine it'd be iSta Breeze. 2. Solar and wind can only really be combined via a shared battery bank. You can run them to the same battery, but turbines and solar panels have to be controlled differently so you're somewhat stuck using independent controls for each.

[@boringsoftware2093]

@@ToysforWatts Thanks for ur answers. what controller can you recommend for 48V LiFePo4 (some suggested using a solar MPPT controller X-D)

[@tresgueroscell]

Thanks to all of your videos I decided to buy an Ista breeze I1500 it was very expensive to get to me all the way to the south of Mexico the controller they sent me says for lithium and I told them I already have 8 lead acid batteries should I be able to use that controller or is it going to be a problem for me ? Thank you in advance if I get any answer

[@ToysforWatts]

Unfortunately I've never had an opportunity to play with one of their charge controllers. The concern with using a typical lithium charging profile with lead acid is that there's a chance it'll just keep raising the voltage until all your water boils off. This is normally how I blow up my own batteries. If the max voltage is adjustable you might be able to avoid this, but I don't know if their controllers have that kind of adjustment.

[@anderstoft7574]

Hi Would a MPPT controller on the DC side of the bridge rectifier, not be a potential good method to reduce the startup windspeed. I am not sure it can react fast enough in gusts. But an MPPT has the added benefit of having and upper power limit, so you would not have to perform your hard stops😊 I'm not sure if you already have explored this option.

[@nhikoid]

I agree, MPPT is the best technical solution, but the ones that actually work are very expensive. So, I've made my own solid state controller using voltage comparator and SSR to quite gently bleed off excess current around a single set point (14.6v in my case). So that avoids the hard stop resume cycles. Only thing is, these cheap ebay SSRs are hugely overrated. So I use 3 diy controllers each with dedicated SSR and resistor. (Can't parallel SSRs). This combined with driving a lower voltage battery band works well for me. Would be interesting to see two identical i2000s one on MPPT and another on basic dump controller.

[@zxrjimmy1]

Is the i2000 good turbine to buy