Ok, you got me there. But now let's do a little bit of engineering. How are you going to adapt this generator so it will survive when it is immersed in water? Or at the least it will be in a damp environment if you mount it externally to the pipe. Then of course you have the problem of coupling the turbine to the generator. How are you going to regulate the speed of the turbine so that it will be a constant 1500 RPM (1800 RPM for 60 Hz)? And don't forget that the turbine has to comply with regulations that are enforced to prevent contamination of potable water systems. Personally I would rather not have oil, PCBs, lead, paint and what have you in my drinking water. So you have to mount it in a sealed capsule. There shouldn't be a problem with overheating, because the water will serve as a good coolant.
the turbine that is being acted upon by a fluid / water does not care about head pressure , it feels the pressure of the water / fluid that is moving in the pipe / penstock
Right, and of course the movement of the water depends on the head pressure. With a zero head pressure, represented by your example of the perfectly level pipe, there is no flow. The greater the pressure difference between the entry to the pipe and the exit from the pipe the greater the flow rate, and the more power there is available.
think about this , water supply pipes are around 10 ft to 20 ft in diameter , you would need to really work at stopping that flow once it had started moving , and if you tried to stop it at the end of the pipe all the momentum of the moving water would most likely explode the pipe at the end.
Right, and that is why when you get it started moving you don't try to stop it by closing a valve at the outlet end. You close it with a valve at the inlet end. In homes this is what causes knocking in your pipes when you cut off the water suddenly. Normally the pressure and flow rate are low enough so there isn't any problem, but sometimes there is. Of course if you put turbines in a pipe they won't cut off the water suddenly. They just slow the rate.
he actually said that water would not flow at all if the pipe was long enough , even if the pipe was not capped at all .. that is when I calculated that getting opinions from people who were really good at physics was a waste of time.
And I suspect that you are taking his statements way out of context. There won't be any flow through a perfectly level 100 mile pipeline if the water level of the source is not higher than the water level of the sink.
So I guess that is enough for viewers to realize that you really don't have any idea what you are talking about so I guess this discussion is closed.
Bill Gill
