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Chris

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Joined: 12/09/2005
Location: Australia
Posts: 146

Posted: 06:10am 09 Nov 2006

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Well i was on discover circuits and stumbled across this... Uses two transistors to measure wind speed...

http://www3.telus.net/chemelec/Projects/Anemometer/Schematic .png

Heres the parent page... its quite interesting.

http://www3.telus.net/chemelec/Projects/Anemometer/Anemomete r.htm

KiwiJohn
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Joined: 01/12/2005
Location: New Zealand
Posts: 691

Posted: 08:09am 09 Nov 2006

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I think a similar system is used in some cars to measure the air flow into the manifold. Maybe the sensors could be obtainable from junk yards?

Chris

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Joined: 12/09/2005
Location: Australia
Posts: 146

Posted: 10:37am 09 Nov 2006

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I know some cars use a hot wire system, so as more air passes over a piece of wire, it cools it changing the resistance...

Or something along these lines. But surely with a semiconductor it should be a bit more accurate i think...

Might try build one later on.

Anyone else got thoughts on this circuit?

Gizmo

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Joined: 05/06/2004
Location: Australia
Posts: 5107

Posted: 09:23pm 09 Nov 2006

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I played around with hot wire sensors years ago. They work very well, if you pass a current through a wire so it starts to glow red, then blow on it, the current goes up! So by using a constant current source to keep the wire red hot, wind speed over the wire is proportional to the voltage needed to keep it hot.

The down side is they need a few watts to run.

Glenn

The best time to plant a tree was twenty years ago, the second best time is right now.
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makourain

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Joined: 19/04/2006
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Posted: 03:14am 10 Nov 2006

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chemelec is what got me in to windmills, but his wind speed meter cant read wind faster than 2 or 3 miles per hour.

nando
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Joined: 16/07/2006
Location: United States
Posts: 3

Posted: 04:47am 10 Nov 2006

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What I have done with very low power was to use small 12 volts 100,000 hours lamps using two of them, one of them the glass is removed and the other is kept as it is .

Two equal constant sources, feeding each lamp, then one measures the voltages differentially to get the wind velocity.

Quite effective and as well, low power, some of those lamps needed around 20 to 30 milliamps, if I ever find my data, it is in storage, I will present it, though it was done in the middles 1960's.

Nando

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