Environmental Engineering Reference
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Group, Henry Jørgensen, urged me not to do so. He said, “if people
are troubled by the parachutes coming out too often, they will just
cut the wires, and then you have no security at all built into your
blades; why don't you use the system designed by Johannes Juul
for the Gedser turbine, the tip vanes.” And so I did, though omitting
the hydraulic system of the Gedser turbine, and designing a spring
loaded release system for the deployment of the tip brake. My main
reason for using a simple spring system, embedded in each blade
was that I would like the blades to be delivered as failsafe units.
Security should not depend on the buyer's ability to make a sound
failsafe hydraulic control system. Security should be delivered with
every single blade. But as no blades were then sold for some time, no
payments came in, and we were in dire straits and near bankruptcy.
After some struggle for funding I asked a private Inventors Fund.
After waiting only seven days, a cheque of DKK 50 000 (USD 10 000)
came into our letterbox one morning. This donation saved my
company and tears of joy came to my eyes. On 13 November 1978
the first set of blades with pivotable tips were finished and delivered
to Karl Erik Jørgensen, and then quickly mounted for the prototype
test. A few days later Karl Erik was ready to perform the test of the
safety system on a windy day. For the testing day I had arranged with
a credible public engineer from the Danish Technological Institute
of Aarhus to attend and witness the crucial test of the emergency
airbrake. I hired a flatbed plotter and connected it in order to
monitor the rpm of the rotor as it speeded up.
Figure 8.6
Failed 22 kW turbine at Stoholm.
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