Aircraft

I am an aircraft mechanic and know fully how a variable pitch blade assy works. I have been thinking of constructing a generator out of obsolete aircraft generators, but don't really know how to convert 28v 400hz power to something useable in a house.

LeRoy

What you have in mind is interesting. The type of motor that you suggest here appears to be a good choice for your application. It will give you the opportunity to use off the shelf transformers to charge two banks of batteries @ 120 volts each. You will need to rectify the current, but this is done easily. An added advantage is it gives you the freedom of having your battery storage a good distance from your generator. If you are planning to convert the 400 Hz. generator output into 60 Hz. for direct use in your home, that's a different story. You have not mentioned the most important aspects of your generator, it's Data Plate Rating. You can convert the output directly into 120 or 240 volts and bring the frequency down to near 60 Hz. electronically. The problem with this approach is that you will loose a great deal of the power (amperage) that is created by the motor itself.

The reason that small commercially available wind generating systems use battery storage is that the amount of potential power can be enormous. It is possible to use two motors, one as generator and one to drive an a.c. generator. Again this approach is plagued with high losses in power with no storage and can only be used when you have adequate winds, as your system would always be under its maximum load. It would appear that you have a lot of things to consider here. Look closely at your data plate, you need this information for all of the computations that are required for reliability. This will give you an idea of how large your wind generator will need to be. I am an old aerospace mechanic myself, this fact helped to encourage me in wind power almost thirty years ago. Once you have a rotor diameter you can go on to proper blade size.

Offered by Jay.