A new type of wind turbine has been developed that mimics the wing movements of a hummingbird.
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It was designed by a company in Tunisia called Tyer Wind. The head of the company, Anis Aouini, has described the technology as "3-D Aouinian kinematics". Hummingbirds can hover and fly backwards. Aouini has described the hummingbird as the most efficient bird with unique kinematics and aerodynamics that have been mimicked into this new technology.
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Biomimicry is to observe and replicate natural designs found in nature. This is what has been done here, where the hummingbird has been analyzed and the design and patterns that it employs have been mimicked and copied into a technology.
The team of designers analyzed and replicated the movements of the hummingbird, except they reversed the energy flow.
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Instead of using energy to fly in the air, energy is captured from the wind and transferred into a spinning axle inside the turbine.
In mimicking the hummingbirds wing pattern movements, the sweeping motion tips form a figure 8 shape. This new wind converter has use this design to capture both the up strokes and down strokes which enables it to be easily scalable. The wings also generate less noise than current models, and might also be less hazardous to birds.
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The design is still in its infancy, and it's still unclear how they would actually perform in a side-by-side test with conventional designs. Aouini claims there are other possibilities such as industrial use, and for car and motor boat engines and pumps.
The biomimitic converter's wings are made of carbon fiber and span 5.25ft each. The current design is capable of producing 1kW of power.
There is some technical data they provided, which is shown below:
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@krnel
2017-01-25, 9:42am
Great concept. However, it is widely known that the more moving parts there are , the more breakdowns occur. This simple fact seems to have been lost as we build more complicated technology . I'm all for progress, but there is a difference between progress and improvement. I've seen so many things that are "new and improved" but not so big on the improved part. The Wankel engine and rotary compressors are two examples.
True. Maybe it's less efficient, I don't have more info on it though. It is interesting looking and hopefully it's not just marketing and smoke/BS. Thanks for the feedback.
At first it looks clunky, as if the momentum shift would be jarring. But when you watch the base for a bit, it looks more fluid. There are a lot of wind generator concepts that seem to be on track to replace the huge props. It'll be interesting to see which one/s rise to the top.
Yup. It sure looks neat, nice design watching the hummingbird wings lol. Will have to wait and see how it performs in quality ;)
Not seen that before. It's an interesting design, but may present some challenges in manufacturing and reliability. A normal rotor has some issues, but it's probably pretty reliable as it's old technology.
We can learn a lot from nature. Those designs have stood the test of time.
Indeed we can. I wonder if this will be a success. There is not much data so far, but it looks promising ;) Thanks for the feedback.
There are lots of people working on new designs. Some places could get a lot of their energy from wind, but we've had issues in the UK with where they put the turbines. There are some fairly near us and I think they look great. I know people say they kill birds, but so do cars, cats and buildings.
Fascinating... I wonder if the same bio-mimicry could be applied for wave-action or tidal generators. Maybe there's a fish out there with the right fins for the job? Thanks for sharing this!
Could be! hehe, I don't much about the water tech, other than a wave generator is built to harness waves, but I don't know if it copies natural patterns of an animal.. Thanks for the feedback!
Wooow!
It is cool & interesting!
It's the soul of wisdom to look at an amazing design such as the hummingbird and then figure out how to employ that brilliant design engineering in other ways. 😄😇😄
Can't wait to see that in action if it is doable!
The artist in me loves the biomimicry, and the engineer in me says "maintenance nightmare." But maybe I'm just being pessimistic :)
Me parece genial talves asi pueda reempazar a los drones de uso cotidiano
Does it hum?