Hydroelectric Waterwheel System - Sustainability

In our project we planned to make a hydroelectric system that would produce convenient sustainable power. I think we made a good effort and were able to get quite far, however we did not finish within the time available. We will finish it later on because it is a worthwhile idea to utilise the free water from their stream. Due to unavailability, most of the time we were not able to form our entire group out at Sams. This meant we could not collaborate at peak level on our project. I enjoyed doing the project because I learnt so much about sustainable energy and electronics.  From this, my next steps are to build my own sustainable generator from a wind turbine, which I plan to power  mobile devices, TV, lights, speakers and laptops from. This is exciting for me but since I am busy at present I am going to continue my own project after exams. I also plan to build an electric bike from old laptop battery cells I have bought, a 250w hub motor and other components I will purchase. I enjoy

On Saturday, Sam and Stefan took down the flume in the stream as it had been destroyed by the heavy rain. We then got to rebuilding it with an opening, however ran out of time. Previously in the holidays, Stefan had a go at rewiring another Smartdrive motor, a 42 pole copper stator. Success! He also began building his own turbine but for wind power. It's going good. Later on it will have a turning mechanism in the wind and it will be mounted in an open area.

Friday and Saturday, 6th - 7th October Stefan stayed over at Sam's house and they both continued to work on their project. Past week or two: All ordered items have arrived including the charge controller, rectifiers and fuses. On Friday, Stefan and Sam began by cutting, trimming and digging their track down into the stream. It looks very nice now. Sam and his dad put together a flume. With the help of a sledgehammer to smash down rocks, they were able to secure the flume into the stream. It is a large wooden track that diverts water to the wheel. Later on in the evening, Sam and Stefan began rewiring the SmartDrive motor into 3 phase 4 x 3 coils in series. Some photos show their work. They finished rewiring on Saturday and roughly tested the setup. Despite their efforts, the results were very disappointing. The wheel was supposedly making just under 12 watts, (12 volts at 1 amp). They figured that the wheel was not spinning fast enough and 20 or so watts were being lost from