On Tue, 26 May 2009 10:18:33 -0500, Richard Casady
wrote:

On Mon, 25 May 2009 13:47:17 -0400, "Wilbur Hubbard"
wrote:

The only "job" wind generators do well is disturb the peace and quite of an
otherwise peaceful anchorage. Look around at any and all sailboats using
wind generators and you will see selfish, inconsiderate jerks who think
their energy hog habits take precedence over the peace and quite of dozens
of boaters who have sensible energy requirements.

To put it bluntly, almost without exception, boats with noisy wind
generators are inhabited by assholes.

The ironic thing is the 2MW units the local power company owns are
actually pretty quiet. Just a soft whoosh three times a second, and a
little whine from the gears. Of course, if you put one of those high
revving yacht jobs on a 200 foot mast, it might not be so loud. The
high rev classic that pumped water on my uncles place wasn't super
loud. I don't remember much noise from the actual turbine, but the rod
to the pump clanked. I had a neighbor with a Rebel [first of the
fiberglass sailboats, 16 ft, 700 lbs.], and the halyard beat on the
mast day after day, year after year. Nobody cared.

Casady

Casady

I suppose that if one were sailing off across the pacific one might be
a bit less concerned about wind generator noise and more interested in
the amps it produced. After all 3500 miles with 12 MPH winds, as Peter
just experienced -- the batteries might get run down a tad.


Of course, in the marina it makes little sense to run them as power is
available right there at the pole :-)


Cheers,

Bruce in Bangkok
(bruceinbangkokatgmaildotcom)