Tidal Generator.

[arkain101]

Okay, you know the effect that occurs when you take a glass and put it under water letting all the air escape, then, turn it upside down and as you try to pull it out of the water there is a suction effect that holds it down.

 

You go out to a place in the ocean, build a large square box. Aprox, 100 feet by 100 feet and 5 feet tall. with sealing doors both on the top and the bottom of the box. Okay so we hook up towers to this device all around, about 50 towers or so. Now there is no water in the box and the tide is down. As the tide comes up the bouyancee of this box causes it to float and as the tide goes up, it turns massive generators with great pressure. Now when the tide is full and slack, doors open and we let the box fill with water. Now when the tide goes out we have a GIGANTUON weight force pulling down as we use the suction effect and the weight of the water to turn generators with a very high gear ratio, so the generators might be humming at 10,000rpm while the box slowly tugs down 1inch every 10mins. Now then the tide is all the way down, the doors open and let the gravity pump all the water out. Again its all air now and when the tide comes around again.. cycle returns. Its a 1stroke system, and would have so much energy that it would be hard to attatch enough generaters to make use of it.

[Queso]

whoaaaaa that is so clever.

i know nothing about this though, but damn if that worked it would be so crazy.

[C1ay]

Sounds kind of like Waves of Power or Oscillating Water Columns from WaveGen.

[arkain101]

impressive, I have never seen those devices before. They are similar I guess.. but, then again not really.

 

I have seen tidal generators that use propeller turbines that turn from the moving current and also, hydro dams that also use turbines. This is obviously not a very effective use of the available energy water can contain. Since so much slips by in the process.

 

In the concept I came up with here. Lets say we have a 50foot by 50foot deck and a set of towers around the pad and all along the inside aswell to give it structural strength. It would look like a grid of towers standing on the ocean floor with a large pad that is able float up and down on these towers. Lets make the pad 10 feet tall.

here we have 2500 x10= 25,000cubic feet (1 cubic feet = 28.3168466 liters) 28x25,000= 700,000 litres 1kg=1litre = 688tons of water not including the suction effect that will turn generators for as long as the tide is in motion.

thats alot of energy. 7,000,000newtons x 5m tide = 35,000,000 KJ's of energy, then add in the estimation of about 1.5 x's the force with suction, 52million kj's.

Pretty rough estimates but thats just a small one.

I came up with this concept awhile back.. but today I spent a moment on it and pictured how to make it work as I planned.

I see it working flawlessly.

 

I am also excited to hear the results on my invention submission to the American patent & trademark institute of america, of my new engine and car designed to get in the ranges of a thousand miles/gallon on pump gas, or, when using the hydrogen setup included it is literally intended to be self propelled. Spent alot of time on this one and cant wait to hear what the engineers and marketers think of it.

[Boerseun]

Tidal power seems fine and all, but the gripe I have with it is the same as with wind and solar. At some stage, you simply won't get any power from it.

Solar panels die at night. Wind generators die every time the wind goes down. And tidal generators will croak every time the tide turns around for an hour or so, when there is barely any local tidal movement.

 

A much more robust source, and a virtually never-ending one to boot, is to tap into ocean currents. They flow 24/7/365. Make a couple of turbines, same as windmills, and drop them in the sea where the current is strong. Water has more than enough torque to facilitate some serious step-up gearboxes to spin heavy-duty generators. And the ocean currents are predictable, constant, and if you have a farm of, say, fifty or sixty of these 'mills', if one or more has to go down for maintenance or repair, you still have a fair set running to supply juice.

 

You'll just have to learn your power technicians to scuba dive.

[arkain101]

sad thing is the ocean loves to eat or swarm any object that shows up. You'd thing there would be alot of required cleaning and maintanance with large systems of this way out in the ocean eh?

Great idea too.. hmm

[Boerseun]

Yeah - corrosion'll be a *****.

 

But I'm sure with advanced in material science, the whole thing can be made from a non-corrosive material, like carbon sandwich or a glass-fibre. The constant motion of the mill's blades will probably stop clogging deposits, except for on the mounts and generator casing. But that doesn't have to move, so it doesn't really matter.

 

Experiences in laying undersea telephone cables can be used to supply an underwater high-tension power line, so waterproofing the electrics shouldn't pose too big a problem, I guess.

 

I have posted a previous thread regarding this same topic, and this is still my candidate for future power supply.

[CraigD]

Now when the tide goes out we have a GIGANTUON weight force pulling down as we use the suction effect and the weight of the water to turn generators …

Your calculations are off by a few orders of magnitude. The water in a 100x100x5 feet box, weighs about 1,400 tons. Assuming the tide height is 2 meters (about right for parts of the east coast of the US), and near 100% efficiency (something high gear ratios are not known for), it would allow you to continuously generate something like 650 W of electric power.

 

Tides are a very viable source of power, but need to involve very big volumes of water. They don’t need to be very complicated or novel in design – basically just hydroelectric dams that can operate with water flow in either directions, closing off a large inlet or bay. There are a few in operation today.

[C1ay]

impressive, I have never seen those devices before. They are similar I guess.. but, then again not really.

Actually, the units in the Waves of Power story are very similar in that they are just buoys that rise and fall with wave action. They are not limited to tidal action though as they continuously bob up and down with the smaller amplitude waves present in addition to tidal rise and fall as well.

[arkain101]

In the concept I came up with here. Lets say we have a 50foot by 50foot deck and a set of towers around the pad and all along the inside aswell to give it structural strength. It would look like a grid of towers standing on the ocean floor with a large pad that is able float up and down on these towers. Lets make the pad 10 feet tall.

 

add in the suction, not sure how much more of a force it creates.

650watts of power ? doesnt sound like much..

It should without a doubt be more efficient than a hydro dam, in top operation.

[arkain101]

Tidal power seems fine and all, but the gripe I have with it is the same as with wind and solar. At some stage, you simply won't get any power from it.

 

True but I already thought about that.

 

And with this design it is capable of making power at all times. Maybe not as much but still power.

WHen the deck is at the bootom on its rest plates on the several towers. it is still full of water. Tide is slack, deck is stopped. One would think the power generation is over with. But As we drain the water we drain it through a turbine. and the gravity pulls the water out and makes a energy. Also, we put a air turbine like ones used in air pressure tide power. So when the water rushes out, air rushes in, causing the air flow and water flow to make power as the deck sits still. Once shes full of air.. All the doors close up. Tide comes up and it floats up making power. Now when it reaches its rest at high slack tide. It opends the doors again. The weight of the deck (which would be immense) sinks under gravity. The water that is forced in goes through the turbine again, and the air the is forced out through the top turns a turbine aswell. once it is fully packed with water, the multiple towers lock the deck from sinking any further. The Top floor openings are sealed up. Now we either at this point seal the bottom passages so its one big sealed water tank or, we leave it open (if this suction effect that I dont understand that well actually has a stronger effect than the weight of the water alone). Now as the tide goes down this millions of pounds of water is suspended by the towers held in the deck. the locks are released as the tide gets near the bottom of the deck. Gears attatched to the towers and deck or hydraulics take over and turn generators. The generators need to be powerful or numreous enough to stop the deck from moving, the motoin of the deck is maintained through the electrical drag of the hundreds of generators. Tide starts to slack out again. We release the water and make a little bit of power again.

See with this system the entire available mass is put to nearlly 100% use. Where as turbines only cut through the mass and let almost all of it slip by while it captures what it can making it far less productive.

I dont know how big these could be built but. Over here on the west coast I have seen nearly 20 foot tides in ciratain areas. You build one to have the production of a couple hoover dam's and your in some serious business.

 

And remember that tides are not just moving up and down water, they are flowing water filling basins. So while this water flows past this structure it can like wise be captured by dam like turbines.

 

In fact have you ever take a spoon and put the back side of it under a tap. You might expect the spoon to get pushed away. But it creates the same lift effect as an air plane and the spoon will become glued to the moving water. The bottom shape of this deck could be made in such a way to Glue it to the flowing water aswell, forcing it to be sucked down with the dropping water levels. Add all that together, you might aswell cover the deck in solar panels. or windmills, since some parts of the ocean are cursed with constant high winds. Then we could really make use of those huricanes that are usually a pain.

 

Then all of this power should be directed to a Momentum station. That is what most electric stations do anyway. They use large capacitors to prevent fluctioation in the electric flow. But if you were to hook this all up to a massive spinning wheel on the ground, that one was to make very friction free. Then have it spinning very quickly, if you could balance such an object. Then it would smooth out the electric flow and (and of course use up some of it) but keep it going when the station is under low power..

Not to sure about the big momentum wheel but.. it was a quick though.

 

So you see this concept is always generating power. you could literally power the whole country with a few of these. Think of it.

[Thor Peterson]

On the British Columbia coast simply by locating Tidal electrical generation turbines approximetley 30 miles apart electrical generation will be available 24/7/365 - slack tide resulting in non generation varies along the coast line two or more turbines thus located will give continuos power as tides are predictable. Vancouver Island has a transmission line running almost the total length of the Island very close to the shoreline thus offering an advantage to tidal generation and transmission. Thor Peterson BC Tidal Energy Corp