water driven Pelton Wheel

[Toepopper]

It was the end of March, 1982. I had been working with a pick and shovel cutting a road into the hillside to gain access from the ranch road up to an old logging skid where there was a flat spot large enough to turn a pickup truck around on. This had been an ongoing project and working 4 to 5 hours per day it took 3 months worth of digging to finally get a trail wide enough to drive on. All the time I was digging, my neighbors, who lived down the road about a half mile, would drive by and laugh at that idiot with the pick and shovel trying to cut a road into the mountainside. One day they decided to stop and introduce themselves and congratulate me on my hand dug new road. We got to talking and they asked me to come over and take a look at their new pelton wheel kit. I had never heard of this but when they explained that it was for producing power from a creek I decided to go with them and take a look. Since we lived way past the end of the power lines this seemed like a reasonable approach to charging batteries. The pelton wheel kit was made by Harris Hydro Power and it consisted of a Chevy truck alternator and an angle iron mounting assembly to hold the alternator in position. The alternator had no belt pulley but instead it had a 16" diameter set of plastic coated metal spoons. These spoons were hit with water coming down 700 feet of 2" black flexible PVC pipe, the upper end of the pipe was in the creek and held in place by some large rocks and the outflow end was reduced down to a 3/4" brass nozzle which was held in a stationary position where it was aimed at the spoons. Once the water was turned on it spun the spoons and turned the alternator and produced DC power to keep a set of 12 volt golf cart batteries charged. I have to admit that I was impressed. These early pelton wheels were not contained so water was flung in a 360 degree arc and we had to dig a ditch to drain away the water once it had been used to spin the alternator. Eventually my neighbor built a small shack to contain the water and lessen the noise of the pelton wheel but the constant exposure to the exhaust water eventually ate through the wood of the roof like a sandblasting machine. Modern pelton wheels come in a containment box with an exhaust pipe to carry the water away and also to deaden the sound of the spinning alternator. To see a utube video of a modern pelton wheel instalation and operation, go to www.umpquasurvival.com go to the LINKS page and click on the micro hydro and a 7 minute video will come up. Modern pelton wheels can be built to be used with only a 10' drop, so if you have a river or creek running through relatively flat land this type of system can work for you.