After 5 month of operation on the test field in Schoondijke the ILWP 2,4 turbine has been replaced by a smaller Hugh Piggott wind turbine design model with a rotor diameter of 1800 mm.
The big free standing tower had to be lowered to change the turbine. This is a delicate operation because of the very heavy weight of the tower. The turbine exchange went smoothly within a couple of hours with just two people (Piet and I).
The electrical system is different as for the ILWP 2,4 turbine. Because of the lower rated power of the small ILWP 1,8 turbine a smaller grid inverter is needed. A Windmaster 500 has been installed that works in a range between 35 and 150 V. This large voltage range will provide grid insertion even at strong winds when the turbine spins very fast resulting in high voltages. The system should still be protected for overvoltage and therefor a LDR 96-15 is installed to dump the excess power to a 1 kW restistor load.
The electronic box:
In the middle the blue Mastervolt grid inverter
Dump restistor with aluminium enclosure on the right
The performance of the wind turbine as well as the wind speed are continuously measured on the test site. The results are posted weekly.