Six high-schoolers. Two cities. 80 miles apart. Every part on this turbine has been through at least two redesigns. The shape, the joint, the way it moves — engineered.
Skeleton frame in aluminum. Lets air pass through instead of catching it. Way less drag, way more stability.
Yaw moment = area × arm. We doubled both. Dual-vane geometry tracks wind direction in real time — no lag, no loss of power on every shift.
16 stages of independent modules stacked vertically. If one breaks, pull it out and plug in a new one. We tried planetary — too lossy. Helical — too sensitive to alignment. We ended up with spur gears: not the fanciest, the most forgiving.
Foam fills the 3D-printed mold and wraps around a carbon-fiber spar. One solid, light, strong piece. Several times cheaper.
A 6 mm square spar takes 80% of bending stress at the root. It tapers into a 3 mm round rod at the tip — weight reduction where load drops.
Yes. A sliding disc on the rotor axis pushes pull-rods; the pull-rods convert axial travel into blade rotation. All 6 blades sweep 0°–90° in 20 seconds. No tools, no disassembly.
Centrifugal pull. Backward bending under thrust. Torsional twist from the gear train. The final shaft is sized for simultaneous worst-case — not the average.
A 3D-printed ring housing, filled with glass beads, mounted on the rotor. Above critical speed the beads migrate to the opposite side of the heavy spot — the counter-force cancels the wobble. Same principle as washing-machine drums and tire balancing. No manual balancing. The turbine figures it out.
Three full redesigns of the pitch hub. Each version solved a problem the last one couldn't. Scroll to see what changed.