"just me" wrote in
:
I'm going to buy a wind generator at the Annapolis boat show. Leaning
hard towards an Air-X
Any thoughts? pros/cons? Who's using what?
I'm not a fan of Air-X generators. They whine, even the new ones with the
improved blades. I won't anchor near one and I can't imagine having one
onboard.
I have a KISS generator and while they're popular with the cruising
community, they certainly have their own problems. They have 3 internal
thermal circuit breakers that open when it generates too much power. Too
much power ends up being over 18 kts of continuous wind. The real problem
with this is that the blades then free-wheel and I really don't like having
free wheeling spinning right above my head.
There's a switch that's supposed to feather the blades, but once a thermal
breaker has opened it's almost impossible to electrically feather the blades
as once you flip the switch, you can almost bet that the other breakers will
open too. The only option then is to grab the line connected to the tail
and swing it sideways to the wind. That's a lot of fun when a squall is
coming through and the (*!&@ is hitting the fan and you're wrestling with the
wind generator. I managed to snap the tail off when the line caught a blade
and the boat hook hit the tail.
If I were to purchase a new wind generator I would strongly consider a
SuperWind (
http://www.superwind.com/swe/index.htm ) generator. I've seen
several of them on other cruising yachts and I was very impressed with the
construction, noise and output curves. They mechanically feather and produce
29 A at above 24 kts of wind. I sure wish that they had been available when
I bought my KISS.
Note that the need and/or usefullness of a wind generator is highly dependent
upon where you cruise. I spend 6-7 months a year in the Caribbean where the
trades average about 15 kts, so a wind generator is very useful. I also have
2 hard-dodger mounted solar panels that provide additional power. I don't
like flip-up wing solar panels that are mounted by the lifelines, as I've
seen these ripped off in big seas.
-- Geoff