wind generator on mizzen mast?

[davec]

I recently spotted a ketch with the wind generator mounted on the front of the mizzen mast! Is this arrangement satisfacory?

Being the owner of a ketch about to fit a wind generator, the idea of not having a separate mounting pole is attractive.

 

[colvic]

There are ketches and ketches and ours is a 26ft. Colvic Watson and we did have a wind gen. on the mizzen. Bought an Ampair middle of the range job and discovered, a bit like yourselves that they do take up a bit of room, especially for us with a canoe stern. Contacted Ampair who said no problem fixing it on the mizzen so had a special bracket made that sat on top of the mast with the Gen free to turn well out of harms way. Worked very well and didn't feel at all concerned about it.

We were preparing the boat for a few years away and constantly moving stuff about and noticed that the boat kept listing, on and off. When going home, went upto the car park and looing down on the boat noticed how much she lent over when the wind blew.

Contacted Ampair again and they worked out that in something like 15 knotts of wind the blades were going fast enough to present an almost solid wall to the wind which then created a barrier which then imposed a load of well over a ton just off centre at the top of the mast.

Took down the Gen and no more listing. We were too small, without a doubt and have since seen many in the Med, albeit bigger than us, with the Wind Gen forward facing on the mizzen between 1/2 and 2/3rds up.

All I would say is pick the model carefully as some are quite noisy and can send some severe transmissions down the mast, especially at night. However, better than solar panels!

Phil

 

[LadyInBed]

I have a Rutland 913 (and a radar) mounted on the mizzen of my Colvic Countess 33. It all works a treat.
Unfortunately Rutland (Marlec) don’t produce a mast mounting bracket, but I found that the Ampair mizzen bracket (part # P1032) is well constructed and when drilled out a few thou, to take the Rutland stub pole, fitted well.
As for noise, I sleep in the aft cabin and have never noticed anything that I would call noise, just a satisfying woosh when the wind gets up.

 

[HenryB]

I have a small wind generator fitted about halfway up the mizzen mast of my Westerly 33. It works well but, being only 25 watt isn't that useful. I couldn't easily fit a pole at the stern because of the boom. I saw a similar size yacht with a large generator mounted on a pole on the stb. rail alongside the mizzen mast. It used wires to hold the pole fore and aft and a horizontal strut to the mizzen mast. This seems a better solution if you want to fit a large generator on a small ketch.

Regards,

 

[kgi]

As the other posts have said as long as the WG doesn't vibrate and turn your mast into a giant tuning fork there is really no problem, except if you need to feather it because of an imminent gale etc, i have seen a few gennies with blades missing that are mizzen mounted, assume its because you can't depower it in very high winds, and once its up there maintenance becomes a problem and in reality doesn't get done

 

[LadyInBed]

No problem feathering or maintaining.

To feather I have put a solid ring on the tail fin, I hook it and turn it 90 to the wind, then put a loop on two opposite blades to tether it.

To maintain, if any ever needs doing, I will use the ladder (from home) that I used when installing it.

 

[grahama]

We have a Nicholson 39 with an Airmairine generator mounted from the old radar plateform half way up the mizzen mast. The Airmarine can be switched off at night, blades are electrically locked(all contained with the WG), if the wind really picks up and the WG noise becomes too much. As for vibration the WG is mounted using rubber between the tube support and the generator 'female' fitting and we have no vibration in the aft cabin, so long as when replacing the WG you make sure that the is no metal to metal contact between the WG and the supporting tube, I got this wrong once after servicing the unit and it did cause vibration.