'Sailing'?? Directly to Windward

High Tacker (www.damsl.com)

Windmaster

How do I put this simply enough to get through???... oh, well, here I go again...We agree that a boat can sail directly upwind. If you think you have devised a sail plan superior to another for sailing upwind, and sailing in general, then, rather than saying, "Here, try this and see if it isn't better," I think you should offer some numbers on the speeds you've accomplished.

I have done that with respect to Jim Bates's wind turbine boats, and your response was, and apparently had already been to earlier queries, not to put words in your mouth, but in essence you have said, "See my videos. All eight of them on Youtube. I haven't seen any movies of these other boats. Any mere talk of anything better than mine is just hearsay, and old at that. So I don't believe you." And now you say that you are the first to believe that videos aren't proof of anything.

You are the one spouting dogma, Windmaster, your own dogma, and it apparently changes to suit whatever you're up against. And such a whiner! You complain that no one has made your model. Everyone is so busy spouting dogma, no one can be bothered taking the trouble to investigate your claim. You feel neglected? No kindred inquiring minds out there? You're wrong on that. I did it, Windmaster, I made essentially the same model and investigated it before you did, in 1965, AND COUNTLESS OTHERS DID IT WITH VIRTUALLY THAT SAME MODEL BEFORE ME, Jim Bates included, and he developed the idea a helluva lot more than anybody else. Your parvenu and rather unidimensional approach to this subject has long since been tested, indeed your model, past which you have not progressed much, was the first rudimentary step for most experimenters and, what's more, has been extrapolated with great elaboration and into the real world.

And you really need to kick your habit of jumping to illogical conclusions. A non sequitur in science is a real no no. To be in the habit of such is far worse than being a poor back-yard experimenter, scorned, un-kissed, but worst of all, not chaste. I have NOT said that Bates's was the last word in design. I haven't said that any last word has been uttered yet by anybody. Indeed I have said that I wish for more development of the idea and that there is room for more, although I THINK that I see the limits of the concept. I see one thing for sure: you are WAY behind.

 

Please point out where it says in the patent anything about a "shaft running down inside the mast" I was referring to a chain drive or similar at the time. I don't think you have studied it carefully. Let me know - I don't want to go through the whole thing to find it myself.

 

You descended to personal insults now, so I won't answer this. It's unpleasant - I hope others can see this.

 

Boy, even when trying to keep things reasonably polite you get the hump, don't you?

OK, remove the words "shaft" and "inside" from my sentence and just leave it as "trying to claim ownership of the idea of a horizontal axis wind turbine powering a boat via a drive running down the mast".

It doesn't alter anything, as your claim covers an idea that had already been built, demonstrated and was in the public domain many, many years before, making it an indefensible patent and therefore worthless.

Personally I think your patent agent did a poor job when doing searches, as there is clearly conflicting prior art, but that is a matter between you and him, not those of us here who are merely highlighting the issue.

I appreciate that you may well have independently come up with the same ideas as others have before you, it happens all the time. I came across the same thing a few months ago when looking at forward facing rowing systems, where there are modern patents that are seemingly identical to ones dating back more than 100 years. I also appreciate that it can be disheartening to have this pointed out, but that doesn't mean you have to take it out on those who point it out.

 

We are talking here about your original model and test. Can you give me the details of this, then we can discuss settings etc. then we can have a meaningful discussion.
You say "essentially" the same model. I would like to know this:
Firstly, what was the windrotor diameter?
Secondly, how many blades?
Thirdly, what was the pitch of the blades on the windrotor?
Fourthly, what kind of water prop? Pitch, number of blades and diameter please.
Direct drive or through gears?
Did you test with a fan, wind tunnel, or outside with the natural wind?
I accept that there is no film of it since this was not easy to do at that time, but since you like to insist on figures, do you have any performance figures?
Maybe a drawing, or photo?
I've found these settings to be very important and make the difference between total success and complete failure.

 

The wording of a patent is very important. If you start substituting your own words for what is actually said it doesn't help your case. Does it say anything about something "running down the mast"? I can only say that I am glad the patent examiners read it more carefully than you. If you can find an example of a wind-turbine boat with this kind of drive before please let me know. Once again, it is not the concept that is patented, it is the embodiment shown in the patent. I really don't think you can criticise the Patent Agent since you are not qualified in that realm yourself. I don't have the "hump" because some of the other things you said were quite positive, but you need to check things carefully before you advance your opinion.

 

Here's the exact wording of the first claim from your patent, as already quoted by me in the post you're referring to:

Look at the wording of claim 1 in your own patent (reproduced above) carefully. Does it not refer specifically to a wind turbine, mounted on a mast, with a drive that connects from the top of the mast to the bottom of the mast and thence to the means of propulsion?

Does this not mean that the drive runs down the mast? It is hard to see how claims 1f) to 1h) could mean anything other than this.

Out of interest, do you still believe that this patent is defensible and therefore valid, or do you accept that it covers the parallel expression of ideas that were already in the public domain?

 

Your assumption is incorrect. If you read the patent further and again refer to the video, of the "big" version you will see that the drive is a belt or even a chain. There is no vertical shaft. Whether you can say the drive runs down the mast is a moot point. It certainly does not say that. The drive need not be in the vicinity of the mast. It is an entirely belt or chain driven device that had not been proposed before.

 

The video isn't at issue here, we are discussing the claim in your patent, which may not reflect what you believe it does.

The wording is very specific. You are claiming that you own the principle of a wind turbine mounted on a mast, connected to a drive that runs from the top of the mast to the bottom of the mast and thence to a means of propulsion.

There is no definition in that first claim of the nature of the drive, so it could be by any means, including a shaft, and it would still be covered (if the claim was shown to be defensible).

I would guess that your patent agent, quite rightly, thought that making the wording too specific would offer a loophole for someone to exploit, so chose not to specifically refer to the belt of chain drive element that you have used in that first claim.

Let's look at the next three claims in your patent:

These do indeed claim that you own the rights to the principle of the first part of the drive being a shaft, the second part being a belt and the third part being a shaft or belt drive, but do they over ride the basis of the first claim that just covers the drive?

Given that there is so much prior art for all of these aspects, I very much doubt that any of it could be defended. As I mentioned before, I don't doubt that you independently developed these ideas, but, unfortunately, that doesn't mean that you have any rights to them if someone else has done it before.

The very irritating thing here is that the patent system is supposed to ensure that any patent issued is novel and does not make claims of ownership of principles that have previously been published and so cannot be defended. Increasingly it seems that patent agents are just taking clients money and not offering good advice as to the likely validity of any patent. The system seems to have become, at least for the small scale inventor, a means for fleecing people, something in common with one or two others areas in the legal profession.

 

Can't help agreeing with you on that. A little late anyway to discuss all the details so long after the patent. That's how it is anyway, however many holes in it. Certainly, don't wish to claim ownership of the basic idea. People tend to jump to that conclusion which is not what I intended.

 

I think the moment mention is made of a patent people (me included) will automatically assume a claim of ownership, rightly or wrongly.

In many ways I support the open source movement, where ideas are shared freely and widespread collaboration results, often giving remarkably rapid development. As a means of getting ideas developed and refined its hard to beat, but it isn't a means for anyone to get rich from them!

I'll admit to having long felt that the patents system is not fit for the original purpose for which it was designed, protecting the inventor. It has become a ludicrously abused system for extracting money from people and businesses alike. The final straw for me came many years ago when people started patenting parts of the human genome. This meant that each and every one of us was walking around carrying intellectual property belonging to a company or university in our genes!

 

Definately. Well the patent we were talking about was 16 years ago so things were a little different then.

 

High Tacker (www.damsl.com)

Windmaster

Re your questions about my statement that I had already made essentially the same small model as your famous WindSpinner. My very first experiment was not at all like yours, but another one shortly later was practically exactly like yours.

At www.damsl.com click on Wind Turbine Rig and you will find a detailed description of my first actual experiment on the idea of driving a vehicle straight to windward using only the power of the wind at the moment. It was not a boat, but after it had occurred to me that maybe a turbine driving a prop could move a boat directly to windward, I thought of the following experiment by imagining a conventional sailboat sailing around and around on the surface of a cylindrical sea, on a spiral track, the resultant of its motion being a straight line from a position downwind to a position upwind without tacking. You'll find a drawing at www.damsl.com in the Wind Turbine Rig section that will help to visualize it. This thought experiment inspired me to get a 3-ft bolt, threaded along its entire length, and oil it up, screw a wingnut onto it, and on each wing of the nut, glue an airfoil, a turbine sail, obtained by cutting a model airplane prop in half and adjusting the pitch so that the two blades would act as sails. Then I got in my car, held this bolt outside the window, with the then truly "winged" nut, a turbine, near the back end of the bolt, which was parallel to the ground and pointed straight ahead, like a lance. At well under 5 mph on the speedometer of my ancient car, the sails whirled around the bolt, screwing the nut along the bolt straight into the wind and I was so mesmerized that I watched it sail right off the forward (upwind) end of the bolt.

In another test run, to see if it would carry some cargo, I added a loose metal sleeve in front of the winged nut, and it pushed the big and heavy sleeve right along the threaded bolt. During one run, one of the sails fell off, but the other lone sail continued and pushed the sleeve right along. So, I called this a windscrew, analogous to a simple sailboat sailing around a cylindrical sea on a spiral track.

Although I hadn't tried a boat model yet, I was then quite confident that the wind-turbine-driven prop idea would work on a boat, the major difference being that the screw would be internalized. With the simple windscrew, analogous to a conventional, or what I call a "simple" sailboat, the "boat" turned around the screw. With a turbine mounted above a boat and a drive train down through the boat turning a prop, the situation would be reversed in a sense, the screw would be turning within the boat, and then behind or under the boat, or in front of the boat as with your, and some of my small models built later, that is, shortly after the windscrew experiment. Of course, for sailing other than straight to windward, some moving parts would have to be introduced in order to be able to rotate the mast, but there seemed to be power to spare.

Without any further experimentation at that time, I rushed to a patent lawyer, thinking that I had hit on something that would make my fortune. His search turned up the 1924 windmill boat patent I have mentioned, and a lot of other wind-turbine-driven things, like, bicycles, trains, cars, an incredible number of devices. This was my first experience with the world of patented inventions, and it was quite daunting. I was a poor graduate student and had paid this lawyer $1,000 only to have revealed to me all these things that were puncturing my dream. It seemed that there was nothing new under the sun, somebody somewhere had thought of everything. Well, said the lawyer, apparently nobody has thought of Bradshaw's windscrew, so you could patent that as a toy, an educational toy, and he quoted me a whopping big fee to get that done. I passed.

I went on to other things, tried to concentrate on school, but of course couldn't get all these windy gadgets off my mind. Talk about getting the wind up you! Some were quite inspiring, so every once in a while I would stop everything else and build another model of something, contributing to my first divorce with all my "nonsense", as the ***** put it, like keeping the bathtub full of soaking balsa wood, on top of not hurrying up to finish school and start making some money, that sort of bla bla bla...

A number of my little boat models were like yours, Windmaster, as were some by other tinkerers I learned about in time, and one of mine was practically identical to your "Build your own" model on your website, except that yours has 8 blades, mine had 6, because at the time I was intrigued with the strength of hexagonal chemical structures, like graphite and diamond. The only other difference is that my fan was quite a bit bigger than yours. Turbine and prop sizes, blade sizes and shapes, everything remarkably similar. At the time, like you, I thought it would be good to have lots of blade area on the turbine. By the way, on your indoor tank test video it says that the fan is on low, I think all the time? Did you test it with the fan on a higher speed?

I varied the pitch all over the place, and yes, of course, it makes a difference. I also made a number of models using 2-bladed model airplane props, reversed, as turbines, as well as using them for water props. I fooled around a lot trying to design and build a turbine for in front of my bicycle, never got around to finishing it, concentrated on finishing school, and then earning a living and raising kids, bought myself a regular sailboat and continued dreaming of windmills but doing nothing about it more than occasional tinkering until I learned of Jim Bates's work through a Cruising World magazine article pointed out to me by one of my sailing friends who had, up until then, been ridiculing me for my claims that it was possible to sail straight into the wind. Even though he had witnessed my little models, he scoffed at the idea of a life-sized boat, as did practically every sailor I broached the subject with.

I think I'm just about talked out on this subject now, having put in more than my two cents worth toward convincing the scoffers that there's a real possibility there. A 40-ft sea-going cat that can do better than half the speed of the wind straight into it and a little better on the other points of sail is nothing to scoff at. Your average cruising cat averages no better speed than that, and can't go at all in that 90 degree upwind quarter of the compass, never mind monohulls, they're left for dead. But it appeals to very few sailors, too mechanical, and obviously scares people, even small ones like yours.

We made a lot of mistakes in the turbine drive for Revolution, a 50-ft. diameter turbine, one mistake being to drive two props through hydraulics, and also mistakes in construction of the turbine itself, by my partner who unilaterally took some shortcuts with Bates's construction plans. If I had a chance to do the big turbine over again, I don't think I would, unless I had a lot more money to burn. My second wife, about to become my second ex-wife, said, "Why are you doing this? This is something the government should be doing. YOU don't have enough money." And she was right, as usual when it came to money, and she proceeded to take half of the little I had left. She's still complaining that she didn't file for divorce before I put most of it in the boat. That part keeps me laughing and loving the boat all the more.

As I've said, read all about it at www.damsl.com, it makes much more sense to use a considerably smaller turbine, or turbine(s) and solar panels, to store energy to power the boat whenever you want, and fast, whether there's wind or not, and when there is wind, then use ordinary sails for propulsion while the turbine and solar panels top up the batteries. If you need to go straight into the wind, then do it with your electric motors, still using wind and solar power, save the diesel.

And there's really not much point in spending a lot of time discussing and comparing little models. They're really not good for much more than giving an indication of the possibilities, unless you go somewhat bigger and in a proper wind tunnel. Otherwise, any speed numbers you get are not reliable. You say that you are near a river, and wind direction pretty consistently adheres to the course of a river in some locales. You should be able to get some decent numbers there with your one-man model. I don't think anything smaller is really worth fooling with past being able to say, hey, wow, it goes to windward.

But by the way, in the late 80s when we had already begun the design of Revolution, largely based on Bates's final turbine design but with some ill-fated modifications, I was in New Zealand and got a phone call from my nephew in New Orleans asking if he could use the wind turbine boat idea as his project for the school science fair. I said to go for it and described how to do it on the phone: from the hobby shop, get a little catamaran kit, some doweling or some kind of light-weight rod for a mast, the biggest model airplane prop you can find (I think he got one about a foot long) and a smaller prop about one-third or so the size of that, cut the big prop in half so you can vary the pitch until you get it right, etc., etc., etc.

The kid did it, set up his exhibit with a tank of water and a fan, won first prize in his school, went on to win first in the New Orleans district, then first in the Louisiana state science fair, then first in the southeastern states regional fair, and then he lost in the national fair to some kid with a computer project. He was not allowed his water tank at the national fair, could only show his model and explain it, so that was a bit of a bust, he said. At some point he was awarded a scholarship by the U.S. Navy, a couple thousand bucks or so.

During all this, he called me a couple of times in a real huff, feelings really hurt, kind of like you, Windmaster, because several physics teachers really attacked him, especially at the national fair where he was not allowed space for his tank for demonstration. And at an earlier fair, where he did have apparatus for full demonstration, one physics teacher took his boat apart searching in vain for a motor and STILL didn't believe what was happening before his very eyes, hypothesized that the turbine wasn't really getting wind from straight ahead, that the fan was imparting a spiral motion to the wind so that the turbine was actually being struck from the sides. I told the kid just to shrug it off, that I suffered some pretty blistering attacks myself, like one physics prof in grad school who scoffed at my trying to invent something even worse than perpetual motion, in that, as he put it, a boat going directly to windward would create its own wind and thus keep going faster and faster ad infinitum, which, of course, is not what happens, it reaches a limit very quickly. But that jerk made me the laughing stock of the class, until I brought my windscrew to class and made him eat his words. Talk about humble pie! His last gasp was to come up with the spiral air from the fan explanation, too, but then I took him for a slow ride in my car, with him holding the windscrew outside the window, back and forth along the street past the physics department with all the students lined up watching and finally cheering.

I'm glad that you seem to have gotten over your little huff, Windmaster, and am sorry if you felt insulted by my last post above. I didn't intend to insult, but I'm afraid that sometimes I let what I like to think of as my sense of humor get away from me. Onward and upward! Put the wind up all the scoffers.

 

High Tacker
Your long post should be informative reading for those on this forum. My experiences are similar to yours although taking place a decade and a half later.

I started work on this, like you, without knowing much about the previous history of the subject and thought I had found a unknown discovery at that time.
Of course, its a path that quite a few others have trodden we now know!
It seems in your case and also in mine that once you start on this road its difficult to give up and it always holds a certain fascination.
Part of the fun is achieving something many think is impossible (or had not thought of at all).

I even devoted a page on my website to the unbelievers and their comments I found on newsgroups. http://www.sailwings.net/objections.html .
The man-carrying boat I made went ok directly upwind, but crosswind it certainly was not so nice as a normal sailing boat.
Therefore my present thinking is towards some sort of hybrid which could incorporate both forms of propulsion.

Another development idea I have is to shroud the rotor. This is in response to the usual objection that "it will chop you up" - better efficiency also. http://www.sailwings.net/shrouded.html
I'm sure you don't think that the rotor is "efficient" - that's cool - you're entitled to your opinion, but I can assure you it goes very well.
One of the advantages of the "multiblade approach" which I advocate, is that the rotation diameter can be kept inside the boat and thus not interfere with other boats or bankside obstructions.
Big rotors such as you had, or the one in Guernsey, OK at sea, would be disasterous on the Norfolk rivers where it would chop up quite a few trees if you were not careful. Admittedly, this is a limited area, but there other areas in the world where it would apply.

I'll continue tinkering with this within my limited means, but my more recent focus is on an automatic self-trimming non-electronic wingsail: http://www.sailwings.net/windthrusters.html which (rightly or wrongly) I have applied for a patent.

 

Years ago when I came up with my 'single-masted ketch' design (aftmast) I thought about patents as well. But then I said even if the idea was adopted to some extent, how big is the sailing market in totality....likely not that big enough to pay me back my time expended and legal expenses of drawing up a proper patent. And then you have to defend it in court. And then think of the changes that will likely occur doing futher development....etc...etc. The patent thing is often an ego thing. Consider open source with lots of contributions.