A Complete Free Standing Mobile Wind Turbine System

If you have an off-grid or hybrid battery system for any size of caravan, tiny home, shack, shed, office, holiday home or any other sort of building then adding a wind turbine is a genuinely good idea. Getting the turbine is the easy bit, however correctly and safely mounting that turbine is another.

At Mannerfarm we have developed a unique wind turbine tower that solves all of the traditional issues associated with such structure being:

1. Complexity and cost of the tower.

2. Ability to easily mount and dismount the turbine to install or perform routine maintenance.

3. Ability to relocate the tower easily and quickly.

Our tower design provides a very stable and strong platform to mount any wind turbine designed to fit a standard 40mm steel pipe. This is an industry standard sized mount for all Micro wind turbines. Built from a combination of galvanised steel and stainless steel fittings the tower can be mounted on any relatively flat surface. It can be erected and dismantled by one person safely and requires only three tools.

1. 18mm Socket

2. 18mm Spanner

3. 8mm Allan Key

The tower uses a three 1800mm leg base design with each leg and the centre having a self leveling, adjustable bolt down large 100mm wide foot capable of 50mm of travel. This allows the tower to sit on uneven ground and have adjustment at each leg end. Since each foot has two 12mm holes the tower can be secured firmly to any hard or soft ground type.

       

The tower pole structure that supports the turbine itself is made up of three parts. The lower part is fixed to the tower base and pivots forward using two large gauge heavy duty gas struts. The gas struts ensure the pole sits at a right angle to the base whilst providing leverage force to assist in the safe raising and lowering of the tower pole. When folded down flat the tower rests on a rubber "V-Block". This is typically done during transportation, assembly and disassembly.

A centre section of 40mm pole drops down into the base pole section and is cushioned by some black stick butyl backed tape. This tape provides some grip for the middle section of the pole allowing you to rotate it as needed but also provides some vibration dampening as well. All turbines generate some form of vibration at particular rotational speeds so it is an important part of the tower design. The upper section of the tower is what hosts the turbine itself. This is inserted into the centre section and secured by tightening the grub screw on sleeve.

  

Wind turbines will weigh in the vicinity of ten kilograms and can be easily damaged if dropped or mishandled. To help in the support of the turbine section two stabilising legs fold down that have self-leveling feet attached. These legs hold the turbine tower at a comfortable height for working on and ensures it cannot be dropped.

 

The turbine is attached to the top section pole and remain in place during transportation, however the blades must always be removed as they are sharp and could be inadvertently damaged. By having the turbine supported in this manner attaching and removing the blades is a simple task. Additionally all wiring for the turbine runs on the outside of the pole using externally rated wire. This is so it can be quickly and easily connected and disconnected from the electrical system via its colour coded anderson plugs.

When raised the gas struts will assist and slowly lift the tower structure upright. The upper tower segment is then fixed in place via three stainless steel guide wires that use a large turnbuckle to connect and adjust/tighten the tower down to each of the three legs. This also allows for a fair amount of adjustment to get the tower perfectly vertical. Wind turbines need to sit on vertically level pole to ensure they can rotate correctly into the wind.

  

If you need to move the turbine tower its a simple task to lower and disassemble. By removing the two bolts on the front base plate the rear legs will swing forward to sit flush against the front facing leg.

Note for illustration purposes the tower kit shown is the fully optioned version that includes the electrical system and a 400 Watt turbine.

For full tower specification and purchasing options please go here.