Loud noise source found?

My husband an I took the wind turbine down yesterday to see if it was a loose nut on the flange that was causing the loud airplane sound. when  we shook the blades they did seem to wobble back and forth more than it should and made kind of a " wa wa"  sound.  One thing we didn't consider was that this nut was gigantic. About twice the size of the nuts that hold the tower together.   We tried to tighten it with a pipe wrench but that would not move it. With the blades on, you really can't get a wrench in there very well.  You really need a big socket to go around this or take at least one blade off.   Here is a picture of what the nut looks like, under the hub cap.

I looked back at my youtube video -  and saw that it was originally tightened down with a pipe wrench but before the blades were attached so there was some room to get the wrench next to the nut. You can also see that the shaft sticks out about 1/4" and now it is flush with the shaft.

We called Redriven to tell them our findings and that we couldn't tighten it ourselves. They said they would send someone next week to tighten this down.

The one month results are in

No drum roll please . . . Since National Grid was here July 27 – call that day 0, we are @ negative 67 kwh. Yes, when there is no wind, you use more power than you make. This month we’ve had a few windy days where we made some power, but we’ve had many more where there was no wind at all.



Where did I get the -67 KWH  reading from? NYSERDA requires the installer to include a meter that measures power going to the grid. This meter goes both ways too. On a windy day it increases and on a no wind day is shows that we are using power from the grid to run the turbine. Unfortunalty, this month we've had a lot of no wind days.

This is a graph from a very close by weather station that shows the winds for August.


I emailed Re-driven to see if they are working on some adjustments in the newest controller software to cut down on the power usage during no wind days. Here is an example of what we were experiencing; We were eating dinner outside on our deck the other night. It was a summer evening without a drop of wind. While we ate, over about a 20 minutes period, the yaw motor turned the turbine twice. I’m assuming it takes a lot of power to move that heavy turbine head and there was no apparent reason to move it. Redriven asked that I move my wind start setting from 2 to 4. (see below pre -change) I just did this yesterday. Hopefully, that will cut down on running the yaw motor when there is no hope of making power.

I finally read the Aurora inverter owner’s manual. One thing I learned was how to set the currency to USD (US Dollars) from EUR (Euros). I like to think of myself as a citizen of the world, but I pay for most things at my house in USD. I’ve also learned how see th amount of power we’ve made in the last 30 days. This excludes the power used to run the wind turbine and associated equipment.


Inverter output


Inverter #1 97.6 kwh

Inverter #2 87.6 kwh

185.2 kwh


It makes sense that Inverter #1 has is reading more power. They are programed to have # 1 come on line first, only after it hits a threshold does # 2 go on line.  This is to save power I believe.


Originally, I was using 9 cents per KWH when I calculated the pay back. Now that I further exam my bill for the exact cost it takes some calculation. The price of power is 6.4 cents per KWH. I get some renewable energy from Green Mountain for 1.6 cents extra charge and the delivery charge from National grid of 5.3 cents per KWH. Also some taxes and the SBC/RPS. This would put my real delivered cost at 15 cents per KWH. I’ll have to use this new figure when I figure out my payback again – after we get some wind.


Delivery 5.3
Delivery Adj. 0.983
Incr Stat Ass 0.307
SBC/RPS 0.594
Tax 0.14368

Electric supply 6.44
Renewable service 1.6
-----------------------------
Total cents per KWH 15.36768


That .59 cents SBC/RPS is the charge that helped NYSERDA pay for their portion of my wind turbine cost. Thank you to all of you that have paid for my wind turbine with your RSP charge for electricity use! I have no idea what Incr State Ass - is about.

So at the end of one month, I’m now $10.29 behind. We could turn off the turbine for “no wind” days, but then we might miss some wind when we are away from the house or in the middle of the night. Maybe by changing the wind start setting from 2-4 will help too.


I still have great hopes for September, when the winds should pick up and we’ll have fewer no wind days eating up my power. You can see from the Inverter stats I'm making power on windy days.


Stay tuned.