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Electric Sail Boat
A Sail boat that harnesses the power of it's motion to recharge it's battery | |
Most sail boats have a small gas powered
engine, used for emergency situations,
and
navigating in and out of the docks.
This sail boat would use a battery instead
of
a normal gasoline powered engine. The
battery would be recharged by a windmill
adhered to the top of the boat, or a
similar
device under the boat. Either way the
motion
created by the boats propulsion would
then
recharge the battery.
This saves money, gasoline, and the
ocean.
Halfbakery: Whirlyboat
Whirlyboat
Without a sail. [jutta, Mar 20 2007]
Physics of Sailing
http://www.phys.uns...au/~jw/sailing.html
Why it's possible to sail faster than the wind. [csea, Mar 20 2007]
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I'm for anything that will save the ocean....that's why I like tuna so much....I suspect tuna flatulence is destroying the ocean...I'm doing my part by eating the critters that do that. |
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Windmill generators for sailboats are so baked. "Sailboat Wind Generators - A wind generator is a critical component for sailboats." |
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// Either way the motion created by the [boat's] propulsion would
// then recharge the battery. |
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If the motion is caused by the wind, the boat tends to move with the wind, not against it; thus the propulsion of the boat makes the wind relative to the boat slower, not faster, and takes energy away, rather than producing it. |
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The reason that wind generators nevertheless work in practice is that there's usually plenty of wind left over. |
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[... and all that turns out to be wrong. See csea's correction, below.] |
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Interesting point jutta. I didn't consider the
physics of that. However the idea of
putting a windmill under the boat, that
spins because of the boats forward
motion, would still function. |
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The amount of extra air flow is more than sufficient for this task due to the extra drag from the water, hot air balloons is another story. |
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// I didn't consider the physics of that.//
Look like you'll fit right in here, Muffin. |
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//If the motion is caused by the wind, the boat tends to move with the wind, not against it; thus the propulsion of the boat makes the wind relative to the boat slower, not faster, and takes energy away, rather than producing it.// |
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You've cited the case where the apparent wind is less than the land-based wind, but it's entirely possible to make the observed windspeed at the sailboat exceed the land-based wind, often by a fairly large factor, by "tacking." See [link]. |
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While a wind generator might slow the boat by a small amount, It's certainly possible to extract useful energy, charge a battery bank (the extra weight could be in place of the heavily weighted keel) and potentially run a small electric engine, when the wind dies down. |
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That makes sense. Thanks for the explanation! |
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This is all probably quite feasable, and more or less baked in pieces, though not widely known to exist by any stretch of the imagination. |
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Windmills on boats are quite common, and some boats connect their propellor shafts up to turbines so they can generate electricity when a stiff current is going... or when the sails are pushing the boat through the water. |
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There was even a japanes guy that put a windmill up to an electric motor, and averaged... five to ten knots. |
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So yeah, this is totally possible. However, the fact that it isn't done much suggests in my mind that there is a reason it is not done much. |
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Possibly this reason has to do with the corrosive nature of sea water, and the typically unreliable electrical systems onboard some private yachts. |
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Who cares though. I'm not rich enough for a yacht, right? |
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