Suggestion: wind energy will make gliders cheaper

The blades themselves are not useful as glider wings but some parts of the
manufacturing base that makes them might be adapted to produce wings.

"RichardFreytag" wrote in message
ups.com...
Sailplane designers,

Modern wind turbine blades are strikingly similar to glider wings.
They are now now coming out in sizes approaching 50 meters. The market
expansion for wind energy is expected to grow rapidly. The ensuing
economies of scale from mass produced wind turbine blades just might
offer significant cost advantages to glider manufactures.

I realize the "flight" regime of a glider wing and turbine blade are
not exactly the same but the cost advantage could be so significant
that the compromise is acceptable; you decide. Also many requirements
ARE the same: lightweight, long, strong, and low maintenance. Back to
cost reduction, economies of scale can reduce manufacturing costs for
things like CRTs factors of 1,000th to 100,000. Imagine a glider
market with wings costing 100th of what they cost now (would we throw
away wings like razor blades when they start crazing - crazy?).

Used as wing turbine blades would require regulatory approval (or do
they if used on an ultralight?). That could kill the idea right there.


In fact this idea is just CRAZY so don't bother telling me its crazy
and why it can't work. There are dozens of reasons not to consider
this. Nonetheless, I'm tossing this out so that some glider designer
might have in the back of his/her mind and some day pursue it in case
there is one way it might work.

Here is a list of the current wind turbine manufacturers in order of
2005 market sha
1. Vestas Wind Systems (Denmark)
http://www.vestas.com/uk/Home/index.asp
2. Gamesa Corporation Tecnologica (Spain)
http://www.gamesa.es/gamesa/index.html
3. LM Glasfiber (Denmark)
http://www.lmglasfiber.com/DK/home/default.htm

Largest US manufacturer:
GE Energy - wind arm (USA)
http://www.gepower.com/about/info/en/windmill.htm

Have fun,
Richard

Bill Daniels wrote:

The blades themselves are not useful as glider wings but some parts of the
manufacturing base that makes them might be adapted to produce wings.

Other way around, perhaps? I "read" (my German is very rudimentary)a
history of Schempp-Hirth a few years ago and saw photos of wind turbine
blades being manufactured some time in the late 50s/early 60s. Does
anybody have any details?

I also understand that a lot of glider wing aerodynamics is actually a
spinoff from research paid for by wind turbine builders. Eppler, for
one, did turbine work I believe. Again, does anyone know any facts?

GC

I remember seeing wood-epoxy wind-turbine blades being built at Gudgeon
Bros. in Bay City, MI in the seventies. Their primary business at the time
was building cold-molded DN iceboats, multihull ocean racers and packaging
and selling WEST System epoxy. Meade Gudgeon said they got the windmill
business because of their demonstrated ability to build long, thin, light
hydrodynamically efficient structures. My guess would be that the windmill
folks learned more from the sailboat and glider folks than the other way
round.

Ray Warshaw
1LK

"Graeme Cant" wrote in message
...
Bill Daniels wrote:

The blades themselves are not useful as glider wings but some parts of
the
manufacturing base that makes them might be adapted to produce wings.

Other way around, perhaps? I "read" (my German is very rudimentary)a
history of Schempp-Hirth a few years ago and saw photos of wind turbine
blades being manufactured some time in the late 50s/early 60s. Does
anybody have any details?

I also understand that a lot of glider wing aerodynamics is actually a
spinoff from research paid for by wind turbine builders. Eppler, for one,
did turbine work I believe. Again, does anyone know any facts?

GC

Graeme Cant wrote:

Bill Daniels wrote:

The blades themselves are not useful as glider wings but some parts of
the manufacturing base that makes them might be adapted to produce wings.

Other way around, perhaps? I "read" (my German is very rudimentary)a
history of Schempp-Hirth a few years ago and saw photos of wind turbine
blades being manufactured some time in the late 50s/early 60s. Does
anybody have any details?

I also understand that a lot of glider wing aerodynamics is actually a
spinoff from research paid for by wind turbine builders. Eppler, for
one, did turbine work I believe. Again, does anyone know any facts?

GC
Not sure when they may have actually started wind turbine construction, but
I was shown some composite turbine blades when I visited Schempp-Hirch
Kirchheim in 1980. Saw some of the first Ventus production also. Very
kind of them to show a drop in visitor around.

Frank Whiteley

Graeme Cant wrote:
Bill Daniels wrote:

The blades themselves are not useful as glider wings but some parts
of the
manufacturing base that makes them might be adapted to produce
wings.

Other way around, perhaps? I "read" (my German is very rudimentary)a

history of Schempp-Hirth a few years ago and saw photos of wind
turbine
blades being manufactured some time in the late 50s/early 60s. Does
anybody have any details?

I also understand that a lot of glider wing aerodynamics is actually
a
spinoff from research paid for by wind turbine builders. Eppler, for

one, did turbine work I believe. Again, does anyone know any facts?

GC

Mr Hanle of Glasflugel(Glasswing) was very active in the development of
turbine blades as a parallel activity to many contributions to
developing the art of building sailplanes. Possibly the photos of
blades were taken about the time that S/H was in the process of
absorbing Glasflugel after his death.
UH

On 13 Apr 2005 05:26:07 -0700, wrote:


Mr Hanle of Glasflugel(Glasswing) was very active in the development of
turbine blades as a parallel activity to many contributions to
developing the art of building sailplanes. Possibly the photos of
blades were taken about the time that S/H was in the process of
absorbing Glasflugel after his death.

S/H built the blades for the first truly huge wind energy rotor,
called GROWIAN, with a rotor diameter of about 300 ft. Afaik this
happened in the early 80's.

We have a couple of guys in my club who earn their living by designing
and building such rotors (blade length up to 200 ft - per blade!) -
believe me, noone is going to want a glider that is built with the
same quality as a wind energy rotor.


Bye
Andreas

Andreas Maurer wrote:


We have a couple of guys in my club who earn their living by designing
and building such rotors (blade length up to 200 ft - per blade!) -
believe me, noone is going to want a glider that is built with the
same quality as a wind energy rotor.

Is that because the quality is too poor, or because the quality is too
high to afford?


--
Change "netto" to "net" to email me directly

Eric Greenwell
Washington State
USA

Well, I have been on a tour of the wind energy installation on the Tehachapi
Pass, and there were a couple of broken blades around. Having looked at
them, I wouldn't dare to bord a glider made with that level of quality...

--
Bert Willing

ASW20 "TW"


"Eric Greenwell" a écrit dans le message de news:
...
Andreas Maurer wrote:


We have a couple of guys in my club who earn their living by designing
and building such rotors (blade length up to 200 ft - per blade!) -
believe me, noone is going to want a glider that is built with the
same quality as a wind energy rotor.

Is that because the quality is too poor, or because the quality is too
high to afford?


--
Change "netto" to "net" to email me directly

Eric Greenwell
Washington State
USA

Earlier, Eric Greenwell wrote:

Is that because the quality is too poor,
or because the quality is too high to
afford?

I've always been fascinated by the use of the word "high" to mean
"great," "strong," "good," and "senior." I think that it speaks to the
nature in which the appreciation for flight is hardwired into at least
some people. Like us, for example...

Anyhow, based on the blade crawled into at Tehachapi, I would
definitely not say that wind turbines are lesser quality, they are just
optimized differently. And those optimizations seem to favor low cost
and low build hours over freedom from waviness and fine surface finish.
They are also optimized to operate unattended for long periods of time,
so the airfoil selection for them is predicated on a certain amount of
roughness from dust and bird crap.

Beyond that, many of you know that I ascribe to Pirsig's view of
quality, that it lies at the interface between subject and object (in
fact, it _is_ the interface!) and is not inherent in either the subject
or the object. Aristotle and his cronies get way too much credit for
founding western philosophy on the unstable underpinnings of absolute
truth and relative quality.

Thanks, and best regards to all

Bob K.
http://www.hpaircraft.com