Here's a project that uses some of those dead hard drives you've got lying around.
In the Tesla Turbine, air, steam, oil, or any other fluid is injected at the edge of a series of smooth parallel disks. The fluid spirals inwards and is exhausted through ventilation ports near the center of the disks.
A regular blade turbine operates by transferring kinetic energy from the moving fluid to the turbine fan blades. In the Tesla Turbine, the kinetic energy transfer to the edges of the thin platters is very small. Instead, it uses the boundary layer effect, i.e. adhesion between the moving fluid and the rigid disk. This is the same effect that causes drag on airplanes.
To build a turbine like this, you need some dead hard drives, some stock material (aluminum, acrylic), a milling machine with a rotary table, and a lathe with a 4 jaw chuck.
Wikipedia has a good review article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_turbine), as well as articles about
Nikola Tesla http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikola_Tesla,
the boundary layer effect (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boundary_layer),
and Reynolds number (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reynolds_number)
(which determines if the fluid flow is laminar or turbulent).
I run my turbine on compressed air (40 psi), and it easily reaches speeds of 10-15,000 rpm. While the speed is high, the torque is low, and it can be stopped with your bare hand.
I have more details on my webpage (http://staff.washington.edu/sbtroy/turbine/turbine.html).
In the Tesla Turbine, air, steam, oil, or any other fluid is injected at the edge of a series of smooth parallel disks. The fluid spirals inwards and is exhausted through ventilation ports near the center of the disks.
A regular blade turbine operates by transferring kinetic energy from the moving fluid to the turbine fan blades. In the Tesla Turbine, the kinetic energy transfer to the edges of the thin platters is very small. Instead, it uses the boundary layer effect, i.e. adhesion between the moving fluid and the rigid disk. This is the same effect that causes drag on airplanes.
To build a turbine like this, you need some dead hard drives, some stock material (aluminum, acrylic), a milling machine with a rotary table, and a lathe with a 4 jaw chuck.
Wikipedia has a good review article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_turbine), as well as articles about
Nikola Tesla http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikola_Tesla,
the boundary layer effect (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boundary_layer),
and Reynolds number (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reynolds_number)
(which determines if the fluid flow is laminar or turbulent).
I run my turbine on compressed air (40 psi), and it easily reaches speeds of 10-15,000 rpm. While the speed is high, the torque is low, and it can be stopped with your bare hand.
I have more details on my webpage (http://staff.washington.edu/sbtroy/turbine/turbine.html).
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Signing UpStep 1: Make ventilation holes in the platters
Step 1 should probably be to disassemble some hard drives but I assume that if you read Make, you've already figured out how to un-Make a hard drive.
The easiest way to make vent holes in the hard drive platters is with a milling machine and a rotary table. Center and clamp a stack of several platters to the rotary table and then you can cut any radially symmetric pattern fairly easily. Just be sure that you use aluminium platters because ceramic platters will shatter when you drill into them.
I made two sets of platters; one with a radial array of holes, and one with radial arcs. The platter with radial arcs in the picture was on the top of the stack and took the most damage. The platters beneath it have very little tear-out and look much better.
The easiest way to make vent holes in the hard drive platters is with a milling machine and a rotary table. Center and clamp a stack of several platters to the rotary table and then you can cut any radially symmetric pattern fairly easily. Just be sure that you use aluminium platters because ceramic platters will shatter when you drill into them.
I made two sets of platters; one with a radial array of holes, and one with radial arcs. The platter with radial arcs in the picture was on the top of the stack and took the most damage. The platters beneath it have very little tear-out and look much better.
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Because of energy loss from air escaping around the platters, friction from the bearings and other natural energy sinks, the inside platters exert more torque pressure than the outside ones (math stuffs go here for proof).
Good thing about this design is that you can use some "simple" thermodynamics to have a relatively low pressure, large area front condensed into a high pressure, small area front to get your air pressure from the wind for "free" (think of a properly tuned funnel) to drive an electrical generating motor thingy off of the axle with those new found magnetic thingies...
Maybe i missed something...
Thanks for the tuto.
.:FFH:.
This IS a stupidly designed device.
the air actually escapes thru the shaft hole.
The Tesla turbine relies on the boundary layer effect and centrifugal force. The air gets forced to the center and out the shaft hole. An exhaust port on the side would ruin the design of the turbine.
If you have a rotating plane of reference, you can have a centrifugal force. Look at the Wikipedia article for it.
Can the efficiency be improved by widening the Inlet Port? instead of just focusing on the blades in the center (does that mean the other disks arent getting airflow or something?) wouldnt that mean that more friction (even with the same amount of air) = More Power/Speed/Torque? Also, I cant understand where the exhaust ports are.
This is a great project!
But I cant do it. xD
(3rd world/ too young problems.)
You just don't always get the choice of what you want for lunch :)
I'm a science person but there is a paradox which binds me to my religious brethren and sisters.
Which is more troubling a God which always was.
Or Infinity and or something created from nothing.
God would have to be infinite and spring from nothingness
&
Science can choose one or the other.
I'm saying there is always a free lunch, you just don't always get to choose what you are eating.
I was trying to be funny at first. (MY Geek humor sometimes does not translate well)
And then I got serious. In the end there are things we cannot know or comprehend. --- Paradox.
Infinity and Causality are paradoxes.
What created something out of nothingness?
If you are infinite then you have no creation or end.
Religious Paradox:
Can god create a rock larger than he can move? lol
But Causality is always a function of the state before that point in time.
Maybe its a circular function? Symmetrical on the macro scale, and non symmetric locally. IN which case we keep returning to 0 and all numbers are positive? We descend into a world of fractals. An infinite rabbit hole that keeps Excedrin selling well.
Something without a true beginning or end is as wacky as any religion!
Causality either maps to infinity or God or it breaks down and is no longer valid.
Causality needs time but if there is no change in time, ie: the universe is reduced to a single common state variable, then all we need is activation energy based on a density function of that state variable, which results in a second state variable.
Then you can map it all with a circular function and say everything is infinite and be satisfied. Except I would say why is there anything?
Science shows us how things work or can work, and philosophy and or religion tells us why?
So to rephrase: How is it that we can get something from nothing?
In the Universe I live in energy and matter are the same thing in different clothing. Practical physics deals with finite measurement. Mathematical abstractions do not have this limit.
Religious Paradox:
Can god create a rock larger than he can move? lol
I would say no based on the 1st law of Thermo. It would be over unity!
Godel The man who reduced the principia to ashes.
If not you are dealing with infinity. With infinity nothing has ever been created or destroyed its just changing form?
Still infinity is a paradox for causality because its saying their is no beginning or end, just points between numbers.
Some things are unknowable, and non computable.
Whitehead in the Principia tried to save us but failed.
Tesla must have included these for a purpose though he doesn't mention why.
The labyrinth looks like a seal.
I wonder are the grooves a sort of brake or governing mechanism, the fluid gets compressed in the grooves and thus slows the turbine down, perhaps?
I know it must be fun to see how fast the turbine can spin but the practical thing must be to turn that spin into power.
Any ideas on the grooves and labyrinth and why Tesla included them.