LOL those first few frames of the video sure didn't look like a sailboat. Seriously though, your engineering and building skills are next level and something for folks to aspire to. Love it.
If you want to push this experiment forward I think you need to explore both : - variable and remotely controlable pitch for the wind blades (so it can adapt to diferent wind velocity and/or point of sail) - axial rotation of the water propeller to make it act as a rudder (more authority at low speed than a regular rudder) - definitely add some keels on the hulls to ake it less "floppy"
@@vovanikotin Changing the pitch on the blades have the same effect, as changing gears. But actual gearing is maybe easier to change while experimenting.
also the wind blades, cannot be a plane, since the center moves slower that outside, this provocate drag, since the tip of the blade wishes to move faster than the center, and this mades the eficiency to go down. Also, another thing that I would like to see is with a vertical wind turvine and/or a wind turbine like the archimedes Liam F1 (I think is the name) One last point, is that there was a new propeller dessign (I think was the toroidal or similar), that apparently was more efficient...
Hi. This was first done in the 1950's, "Popular Mechanics" did a model rotary-sail boat. The big problem with these things is they sit in water which being fluid allows the boat to go awry. When the "drag" on the windmill exceeds the "thrust" of the underwater propeller the "radio control" becomes purely theoretical. I redesigned it as a little four-wheel cart. My thinking was that with positive contact with the concrete it couldn't go off on its own. The drive wheels were geared down using a rubber turn-table belt twisted through 90 degrees, so the windmill did a lot of spinning to produce a top speed that would only have a snail hanging on for dear life. It always worked well until the belt ran off the top pulley! Made today using model bevel gears it would be quite possible to make a steerable wind powered cart in which the windmill always faces directly into the wind by using a tail-vane. Slow motion races around a tennis court could become the next "geek" sport. Cheers, P.R.
One of those "vertical-axis wind turbines" would be interesting. Would simplify the gearing at least. Doesn't matter what direction the wind is going too, so no mechanisms for pivoting.
Vertical axis wind turbines are as close to "free energy" as you can get without actually claiming free energy as ever possible. They have absolutely abysmal percentage of harvested wind energy from available wind energy. They have huge wind surface and only a fraction of that grabs wind. The rest is just a useless wall, which in case of a boat - would behave like a giant parachute.
@@NGC1433not really true, the Darrieus designed is only a little less efficient than the commonly used horizontal axis designs since it’s not a design reliant on resistance. You can also get higher output per area compared to a horizontal one since they need less space.
@@NGC1433 Hybrid designs such as Darrieus can get 39% efficiency, but yeah compared to HAWTs 59% in ideal circumstances, its not "better" than HAWTs, however they are a lot less complex to operate. I build a few Vertical axis turbines in miniature scale (approximately 1m high and 20cm radius) and while it does not power a house or anything it was more than enough to drive night lighting in my garden and it was handy to have some 12v power at the other end of the estate for garden work. It charged batteries no problem. I have to add the disclaimer that I lived on top of a hill and it was extremely windy where I lived. I think it maxxed out at 50w power generated in a storm lol, not more than that for sure. I think it should be doable to do this with a VAWT too, the remaining 59% of the energy is not directly causing drag or otherwise countering forces neccesarily. A VAWT can also have collapsing blade design that theoretically "beats" the betz limit in the sense that the collapsed blades does not cause drag or reduce power generated, though these designs are very impractical at scale, they perform brilliantly at small scale.
Rather than increasing the propeller diameter, would it not make more sense to design the gearing so that it spins faster than the turbine instead of 1:1?
I think you could use the bevel gear to increase the ratio between the turbine and the propeler, so that the propeler would turn faster. In my opinion (but I am not an expert in this), it would be more efficient to have a fast turning propeler with a slow turning wind turbine. Also, I think having the mast turn with the blade insted of the boat would reduce the drag of the boat
I agree. Couldn't one develop gear ratio that leverages the huge torque-- like the wind turbine farms. I am no engineer so I can't offer anything more than an idea.
The same effect can be achieved with less losses by adjusting the ratio of the size between the turbine and propeller - I suspect Daniel has already considered this and used it to size the water propeller.
@@waxt0n It would significantly hamper the rotational freedom though. Bevel gears have a built in slip-ring capability, but belts would need some kind of intermediate transfer, which negates most of their advantages.
Good work !!! In 2000 or 2001, when I sailed a lot, in a sailing magazine I read an article talking about sailing 0° upwind, with an "apparatus" like yours. I remember this performances: it sails 5 kts upwind with 13 kts of down wind. Greetings fron Argentina !!!
The funny part is that, the way you made the boat, the way to go against the wind is to rotate the boat (and the wind turbine blades) backwards, because of the drag created by the blades of the wind turbine. Putting the drag in front of the center of mass and center of thrust only helps destabilize the system, which is why it seems to be so stable while it's "facing the wrong way", at 8:00 to 8:30.
Awesome video. I had a beautiful 1 meter RC sailboat for a few years. The best thing I ever did was add a small electric motor shaft and prop. The ability to bring it back to me was great.
Something you missed about sailboat dynamics: The sail is not the only force acting on the boat, unless you're going directly against or with the wind. The maximum speed a boat can get in a Run is the speed of the wind, and realistically the water drag reduces that speed. If the boat is going across the wind in some way, the normal force from the wind on the sail is counteracted by a normal froce from the keel pushing on the water. Adding up these two normal forces, you can see that the resultant force is forward unless the sail is directly in line with the keel. Basically, the boat gets squeezed between these two forces and shoots through the water like a bar of soap shooting out of your hand. The fastest speed a sailboat can go is somewhere between Beam-reach and Broad-reach, and not by a small margin (a super high efficiency sail-ice-skate can go 3 times the wind speed on the beam). That's why a sailboat can go upwind at all; if the wind simply pushed the sail normal to the sail's angle (like putting a sail on a barge), you would only be able to sail downwind at some angle. In some sense, the keel becomes a section of a propeller.
For your wind vane, you might be able to maintain effectiveness and reduce drag by increasing the length of the lever arm. A smaller vane placed farther back along that shaft could provide similar leverage without so much drag. Great video though! Love anything boat-related
I love when you do projects like this, the goofy propulsion projects that aren't going to change the way people do things but are still amazing accomplishments. Well done!
So you remember Keven Costner's sail boat in the movie "Waterworld" released in 1995. The trimaran used a three bladed Darrius wind turbine and sails. Your project will work with a vertical turbine, but when you sail downwind, the craft will be slower than pure sail.
I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE seeing personal applied physics and engineering. This nakedly demonstrates human ingenuity & creativity applied to problem solving. More, please! ❤
Even though they're less efficient, what about using a vertical axis wind turbine (or turbines!) to drive the prop (or props), since it would require 1 less beveled gear set and the turbine assembly wouldn't have to "turn into" the wind?
The losses due to beveled gears can be lower than 2% when produced well the typical difference of efficiency between Vawt and Hawt is around 20 % though I would find it interesting as well it will probably work even worse
I used to do a lot of sailing and can say that the best point of sail is the beam reach where efficiency of converting the apparent wind direction and energy into forward motion over the Earth. keep in mind that as the sailboat gains speed the apparent wind direction changes forward more so beam reaches in reality end up being slight downwind in actual movement direction when the apparent wind is exactly 90 degrees off the beam. Sailing with the wind will seem slow but usually waves and surface water flow is in the same direction so even though its not as efficient (in most modern sailboat rigging schemes) you are still making good headway. When close hauled you will feel like your really moving with the wind in your face and waves crashing under the hull but in reality the drag of the sails and hull against the waves are now directly counteracting against your direction of motion making it a slower point to sail. Tacking further reduces your efficiency because your not traveling the desired course in a straight line (the actual distance your covering will be at least 33% greater than the straight line into the wind). Also a correction that the sails fully provide forward force. In fact its an interaction where the hull of the boat, either by keel or dagger board will prevent the boat from too much leeward slip. The best analogy is like squeezing a watermelon seed in your fingers and it shoots out blunt end first because the forces your exerting only have one direction of relief and that is out. Similarly the sailboat being pushed to the side does not want to go that direction so the direction it does go ends up being forward. Lastly the mechanical efficiency of the wind turbine/propeller is never going to be as practical as sticking with sails with many of the reasons illustrated in your experiments. Given an RC sailboat and the turbine powered boat the sailboat would have handily beat the turbine boat in a race. Also if you did this in full scale I would not want to be on the deck of a boat with those massive turbine blades spinning over my head. The thought of that and how bad an accident or failure would be is simply too horrifying to contemplate for long.
Brilliant project, I like it very much. It reminds me of crazy drawings that I was doing in the 80's trying to find a way to move sailing boats upwind more efficiently
My idea on solving the screw being too slow is to connect the rotor sail and the screw with a remote controlled CVT and test the optimum gear range. After you get the data and find the gearing solid, magnetic gear couplings might help since both input and output shafts can be placed diagonally (to save weight and space), also theoretically less friction.
I believe that the 45° air propeller pitch is probably optimal for the same reason that a beam reach is the fastest point of sail on a sailboat (where the wind is at a 45° angle to the sail). Interesting project.
I don't know about sailboats but something about wind powered cars and the optimal pitch angle is dependent on blade profile and wind speed so this is not necessarily false but having adjustable pitch control is pretty necessary for good performance with different wind speeds
"(where the wind is at a 45° angle to the sail). " The most optimal is to have the wind blow directly into the sail from behind the boat, so zero degrees. If the wind comes from the side at 90 degrees to the ship, the optimal angle really depends on the type of sails that the ship has. Sails don't just deflect the wind, they provide thrust too so the deflection angle is not really the most important factor. It's fascinating stuff, worthy of a deep dive.
@@vinny142 That is not correct. If the wind is behind a sailboat, the maximum speed it can achieve is the speed of the wind (unless you get into this fancy propeller stuff, which is a different topic.) Having the wind behind the sailboat (which is called a run, as you may know) is the *slowest* point of sail (aside from sailing directly into the wind in the no-sail zone). The fastest speeds a sailboat can achieve is at a beam reach, at which the sail is set at 45° degrees to the wind. My point stands-the reason he was seeing an optimal performance at 45° of propeller pitch is exactly the same reason a sailboat goes the fastest when the wind is coming 90° from the direction the boat is facing and the sail is set to 45° degrees to the wind. If you still disagree with me, let's go racing sometime. :D Welcome to the "people correcting people incorrectly club" @vinny142.
@vinny142 Beam reach (wind 90 degrees to the boat) is much more efficient on modern craft than downwind. Going downwind you're using the sails to produce drag, and as you go faster the relative wind decreases. In a beam reach you're using the sails to produce lift, and the force generated is very close to the direction you're going, and as you go faster the relative wind doesn't decrease
An aerodynamic profile on your wind turbine blades should make a huge difference because the flat blades you have might only be achieving a L:D ratio of maybe 6:1 whilst a good aerofoil could have in the order of 20x that.
@@gary6449 gary has got it right. Blackbird works better because of the aerofoil design of the blades. The flat blades just provide a deflective pushing force and a heap of drag , rather than the suction like force from an aerofoil
Thanks for the Video. This is a fantastic idea. I adore it. This way, we can easily construct a sailboat without sails, equipped with a sufficiently large variable-pitch wind turbine generator to counter adverse weather conditions, even when stationary.
I've been designing one of these for a while now, my first attempt (I have a couple of videos) performed similar to yours. You should read the documentation given in Optimal Blade Design for Windmill Boats and Vehicles by B. L. Blackford (1982), that is chiefly about the design of turbine powered boats, and gives some numbers as well as known-functional blade design offsets. There is also (amongst others) the vessel Falcon, previously part of the National Maritime Museum in Irvine, Scotland, which was a full-size boat powered by this method. The comments on higher aspect ratio propeller and more efficient (non-planar) turbine blades are spot on, and also what I've been working on with my double-size V2 design. My version one design used a cam-pitch linkage to change the pitch of the blades depending on the direction of the hull relative to the wind, but I ditched this temporarily after realising that I had more elementary problems to overcome first. V2 is ready to go, and I'm currently awaiting a nice windy day to run some tests!
You’re my favourite RU-vidr by far. Your quirky shots of turtle shells, floating bottles and such that you always have are totally irrelevant and therefore genius, they show your sense of discovery and curiosity for the anodyne. I also love your harbour shots and the graph showing scam innocent investors!
i design a boat with this propulsion method as a senior at UMaine in mechanical engineering. I met with a guy who built a working prototype and went for a sail. my calcs showed his independent design was close to optimum.
I hope you continue with the traditional sailboat design. I'm especially interested in an autonomous sailboat that can automatically tack, wear, and perform all other normal sailing maneuvers to reach any desired destination.
@@rydenkaye9735You kids get off my lawn! *shakes fist menacingly* Wow, I didn't think anybody would notice that. But yeah, I would love to at least partially automate my R/C USS Constitution.
I think a twin - counter rotating prop set up would help with directional stability. You could also run a shaft inside each hull.. reducing drag. I think you are on the right track with higher aspect ratio water props Great video !
Great project and very well engineered!! I'll bet with enough engineering it could compete with standard sailboats when sailing into the wind, since it doesn't have to tack. If the streamlining were developed enough and perhaps if it were combined with hovercraft or hydrofoil technology to eliminate drag, it is likely possible. Incidentally, I have a series of ion thrusters on my channel, that are patented for lifting themselves and their power supplies against gravity!
In 1985, Commandant Cousteau created a boat called the Alcyone. This boat had the peculiarity of being powered by a tourbine housed in the mast. You can find all the information you need on the wikipedia page. It's an evolved version of what you're about to do. I don't know why the concept didn't catch on, as it was innovative for its time.
8:20 sailors call this heaving to/hove to, useful in blue water to keep the boat as stationary as possible by balancing the sail forces with the keel drag. Neat that you found it with a prop and wind turbine!
Had an interesting thought: What if, instead of a propeller, you used a parachute or kite that pulled a rope wound around a drive shaft? Kind of like an old-fashioned cuckoo clock uses weights, maybe it would be possible to use wind in the same way? You’d probably need to attach a balloon or something to keep the chute up, and gear the water prop to push more water for less rope unwound (or use a compound pulley system). If you found a way to close the chute, you might be able to set it up so it switches between two chutes - the high-drag open one reeling in the low-drag closed one, thereby making it almost perpetually running. On the other hand, this might be a better project to try out on a land vehicle with more efficient wheeled drive.
I'd love to see you make a foiling monohull/catamaran, like the AC75/F50 racing yacht, respectively. You could make the ride height (foil control) automated using lidar, like the AC40's.
Integza is gonna make this but the turbine turns a jet engine and somehow make it work, or use it as a pump for a liquid rocket. Of course with 3d printer parts and a pulse jet has got to be involved.
Ah, I just realised who OP is, I assumed someone knew you were planning something like that, now I’m wondering if it’s just a joke but also err… I mean, you’re considering it now, aren’t you? 😂
Everything you are talking about has been done before. As a Sailor, sailing to weather is a part of the enjoyment of sailing. It looks as though, you are having fun, so carry on!
Peter Worsley has done some really interesting stuff and not only with rotary sails. I have seen his videos multiple times and plan to try his idea of a self trimming wingsail on an old Sea Devil sail boat. I built a reverse flow double wing sail on my Sea Devil (I saw it on a video from tsstproa - who has also done some really interesting stuff) that got lots of attention from other people on the lake - that would sail in almost no wind, and go very close to the wind, but had some issues that I havent yet got worked out.
Hello, I hope you read this, I remember about 20yrs ago it was proven that the paddling under water motion a ducks feet do is way more efficient that a propeller. But the rocking on boats made crews sick and a ridged structure break apart slowly so it was never used for shipping etc. But a slightly flexy boat with no crew would be fine
That's awesome. I really enjoyed this video. I wonder if trying a few different gear ratios between the sail and drive props would help? You could also utilise some components from a rc heli to have a nice efficient driveshaft and even variable pitch
This is an awesome idea. Also very related to the Veritasum video of sailing faster than the wind. But in reverse. Could you put a uni joint/cv on the wind turbine axle so you can change the direction of it vs the boat??
This has been done decades ago 1:1. Search for a project called Aeolian (or something in that direction), an ocean going yacht with a wind turbine on the top of a mast, generating the power do either directly drive the prop mechanically, or store electricity in batteries, to power an electic motor, As long as there was wind, you could go in any direction you wanted, even directly into the wind.
I have always been fascinated by the wind turbine boat idea. I have some ideas and observations. First, an inherent issue may be the air friction(drag) of the wind turbine blades moving at high speed. That's the biggest difference from a stationary sail. So what if, instead, a many-blade low rpm 'high torque' design was tried? The blades would still need to be a very accurate airfoil, but they would be facing almost into the wind. Another issue is the tip vortices and the fact that air near the hub isn't doing much. So looking at the swept disk as 'sail area' you'd want a much bigger diameter rotor. I don't agree that a Darrius style turbine would be better, because this would drastically reduce the 'sail area'. The comments about your airfoils are right, you need a correct airfoil and yes you should be gearing the prop way up or going to a larger prop with a higher angle of attack on the blades. The most efficient water props actually look like airplane propellers, they are instead made stubby to protect them. Then of course there are these new 'loop design' props, which astonishes me that they (supposedly?) work better. Wind turbine boats work well enough to be acceptable in performance and they are Just so cool. Another interesting idea would be a turbine that compresses air instead of turning rotary shaft, and This air would be blasted out of an underwater eductor nozzle for thrust.one last idea: q combined wind turbine and solar electric boat ,Where The solar panel would block The noise and the hazard of the spinning blade and both would simply be connected to a conventional electric trolling motor. Awesome work, thanks for showing us!!!
Super weird thought: Is it possible to have a cutaway section of a tesla valve on the hull? That way it would in theory promote flow in a direction, and reduce the flow in opposite direction?
"Most diabetic ducks in history" Haha. But was the bread gluten free? This was an amazing build, and seeing the Ionic Thrust Catamaran hull alive once more was exciting.
I love this. I'm a professional sailor and Mechanical Engineer that lives just off of Green Lake in Seattle. You might want to experiment with your mast location as this is considered the Center of Effort (blades) vs Center of Lateral Resistance (hulls/keel). This affects how the boat can turn. Also, you might want to look into asymmetrical hulls. Hobie cats have used this to assist in tacking.
Mast, yes, but asymmetric [sic] hulls regarding tacking? They're more to do with reducing leeway, IME. Hydrodynamic lateral 'lift' - when one hull's more in the water than the other, as cats do. Tacking ease would be afforded by spring in the hulls - banana-bendiness - so that the bows and sterns would be more raised from the water, or less immersed, than the centres. ['..just off of Green lake'. Is this because those who speak American can't decide whether 'off' has two f's or one? ;-) )]
The "magic" also resides in the fact water is much more viscous than air, which means the small water propeller has a lot more "grip" into the water than the air turbine has drag. (You also kind of touch this with the land-based Blackbird) Incidentally, that's also why traditional sailboats can go against the wind: their keel/daggerboard/centerboard has enough "grip" into the water to limit the angle the whole boat drifts sideways, despite the lift from the sails being exerted mostly sideways and very little forward. Looking forward to your next experiments. Also to try on the same platform: -vertical wind turbine (one less beveled gearing): Savonius, H-bar, Helical -horizontal wind turbine (lower momentum, and using the wind gradient to your advantage) -inverting the roles with a Flettner rotor (Magnus effect) -autogyro (bonus points if you can use the autogyration to recharge the batteries)
not going to read thru 1,600 comments..so here´s mine... put a kort nozzle around the propeller (more thrust)make a more hydro-dynamic rudder(less drag) and reduce the distance between then prop and the rudder as much as possible(better steering control)...thanks for the video... good luck!
For a sailboat, the center of rotation of the boat is the keel. Adding the keel would help the directional stability. If it could be controlled and moveable from the bow to the stern (and back), you could turn into the wind easily with the keel towards the bow, and away from the wind with the keel towards the stern. Of course, it is additional drag, though.
You’re right about the efficiency of wheels vs. a propeller; our Chevy truck had a 5.0 liter V8 and 5 gears. The 20’ Boat had the same engine, but stays in 1st gear the whole time!
I know on slower rotation speed like you get with human powered, a water prop that looks like an airplane prop is more efficient, with less drag. The boat props are in the 1000s of RPM. Larger vessels may be slower. Greg Willoughby is an engineer from Australia that specializes in fluid dynamics that helped me with mine. I now use a 14" with a 12 inch pitch for my boat. Hope this helps.
Skip the gears and use the wind propeller to generate power you collect and use for electric water propellers : - makes desired speed independent of wind speeds (from backwards to hover to forwards) - anchored you just load your batteries - no wind you can get home
hi. i did this a few years ago on a 14ft long speed boat. i used a vertical wind prop and gearbox to increase the ratio to 1:10 and the water prop increased in rpm. the vertical wind prop didn't need to be swiveled. it caught the wind in any direction. i had to also designed a brake system to slow down the shaft to stop. if you need any info feel free to contact me.
Bernhard Schmidt, the Estonian inventor of the Schmidt camera used in astronomy, also built a boat propelling itself straight in the wind. This was about 90 years ago.
I have thought about this for many years. First you need an efficient windmill and water mill. Then they need to be matched. Like matching airplane motor to propeller. 3rd combine with wing sail if possible. It will make tacking a lot steeper into the wind. You have proven the concept now you need to improve on it. This could be revolutionary.
Okay, crazy idea - probably far more mechanically complex than it would be worth - but get this: Flywheel, Clutch, gears. You’d probably need adjustable prop pitch on the windmill to get the fly wheel spinning from stationary but, have the boat anchored while the wind gets things going in ‘neutral’, then engage 1st gear to transfer torque to the water prop without having too strong of a brake effect on the windmill, then as you accelerate, shift up to 2nd to take advantage of the vessel’s forward momentum and so on - I mean, you know how a car’s gearbox works. As an extra little adaptive touch: variable geometry weathervane-rudder. Nice and splayed out for low speeds / winds, but can narrow itself for higher speeds / winds where less surface area is needed for an effective weathervane and you can reduce the drag coefficient. 😃
In the 1980’s Glasgow University’s Naval Architecture Dept successfully built a small monohull capable of carrying at least one person, powered by a three-bladed air propeller driving a water propeller. It could head directly into wind.
My first thought: cannot work. U prove me wrong. Guess it needs a ratio wind 1:3 water ish By the way I'm building a solar boat similar to your whaler but with a solar roof and only small panels on the side like yours. Right now I'm building the roof and waiting for 4 boat delivery. New boat since I saw your restoration vid.😅
My trimaran 1.20 x 1.20m base and a mast of 1.85m has no keels either, but the hulls are tapered and it does have a centerboard on both outer hulls. It's enough to keep it on course and to be able to steer with relatively small rudders. Both outer hulls are positioned higher than the main/middle hull, so it effectively sails like a catamaran with only the downwind outer hull in the water, giving it much more resistance against being toppled over than a catamaran. In heavy winds it even lifts the main hull, giving it much less displacement. But that's tricky to balance. Also, a sail ship doesn't get blown forward, but sucked forward. Just like the wing of an airplane gets most of it's lift from the top of the wing, a sail gets most of it's power from the down wind side of the sail. Sails have more or less the same shape as a wing and the principle of generating 'lift' is the same. Ofcourse there's little to no advantage in a 3 hull design when 'sailing' straight into the wind.
+1 for variable-geometry turbine blades, that would definitely help controlling blade rpm in high winds. Bigger prop + more aggressive gearing for higher prop rpm and more thrust. Add some camber to the blades to get more bernoulli's. Also (I think someone might have said this below) you might not need a vane if you reverse mount the wind turbine. The drag created from the lift should be enough to keep the blades angled into the wind. Honestly scaled up and with some PV running down the catamarans to help keep a battery bank topped up, this could have some real application as a drone.
Love your thinking and effort. You are looking for a "rotary sail". How about profiling the wind prop as a "rotary sail". a deep cord of the blade next to hub to nothing at the tip. Blackbird is doing this with its prop design. I have no idea about the drag and ratios, just seat of the pants sailing. Try different sail blade camber profiles. Keep at it.
I was thinking about this project. It seems to me that, provided the prop is producing ebough torque, increasing the diameter of the water prop and, upping the gearing to 5-1. I d love to see if possible, also twin screws perhaps. Great videos. I absolutely love them.
Excellent experiment. The older small racing catamarans used dagger boards just outside of each hull near midship. This gave a bite on the water without a full keel. The dagger boards were rounded on the leading edge so as not to foul on debris.
