Thanks Doug. I am using an Arduino microcontroller with servo motor to do fine adjustment of the throttle. There is a speed pick up on the output shaft. Simple, cost effective - about $40 all in.
As to flywheel, we already have that but I suspect we could make it heavier. Have you any experience with having an intermediate gas storage tank to provide gas when a >50% load is suddenly added to the system? Kind regards Rex Rex Zietsman Principal Consultant -----Original Message----- From: Doug Williams [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: 02 April 2015 09:08 AM To: Rex Zietsman Cc: 'Doug Williams'; 'Discussion of biomass pyrolysis and gasification'; [email protected] Subject: Re: [Gasification] Two Engines One Gasifier On Thu, 2 Apr 2015 08:35:08 +0200 "Rex Zietsman" <[email protected]> wrote: Hi Rex, Comments in the text. > Thanks Doug. I was imagining the challenge of trying to start the two > engines including the gas distribution but had not given the harmonics > a thought at all. Good point. Really where I am coming from is to have > a common generator. The challenge of getting two generators to run in > sync is fine on the MW level but a huge challenge down at small scale. > As it is, speed control is already somewhat of an art as the speed is > a function of load on the generator and a change in speed has an > effect on the load of the gasifier where the gas CV changes until the new equilibrium is established. Because you are making something different, away from the tried and true, I suggest the first thing on the main shaft would be a heavy fabricated flywheel to smooth load changes. then on the engines, either mechanical or electronic governors. Unless they are running electronics, the slight variations of frequency should not be any bother. I have used American Pearce mechanical governors in the past and still have a couple of new ones still in the workshop. > Just not as simple as adjusting the throttle as one would with > petrol/diesel. I agree, and the governor is important if generating power. There are two choices, one for rough mechanical RPM and the other for rapid response power generation. > > The clutch you mention: I am assuming that you would put a stripped > down gearbox on the end of the motor and use a normal car clutch. This is the most basic way and the clutch plates have a long life in that role. > If there is a > simpler method, I would most welcome it. Well you might explore the availability of marine conversion clutch kits, which used to be quite popular for DIY boat engines on the Internet >We frequently want to be able to > offer a system that can both drive a generator or a mechanical devices >such as a maize mill. A belt drive clutch would allow us to choose run >the generator all the time and to pull in the maize mill when >required. Do you know of any system that has this? I would guess that India/Thailand might be a good place to look as they use a lot of belt driven machinery. We were never asked to supply anything with these features, so have no drawings to copy. Possibly I could look at an electric > clutch similar to that used with air conditioners. Any advice would be > appreciated. Not sure about an electric clutch for power generation, but it depends on how much H.P. it can take. See what you can find and let me take a look for a second opinion. Doug Williams, Fluidyne. --- This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software. http://www.avast.com _______________________________________________ Gasification mailing list to Send a Message to the list, use the email address [email protected] to UNSUBSCRIBE or Change your List Settings use the web page http://lists.bioenergylists.org/mailman/listinfo/gasification_lists.bioenergylists.org for more Gasifiers, News and Information see our web site: http://gasifiers.bioenergylists.org/
