This is the WindSprinter, an attachment for Lego or handmade cars to make them powered by the wind! Just slide the WindSprinter onto your front or rear axle and get rolling!! I designed the turbine using Autodesk Inventor.
1.Theory
The WindSprinter is based off of an old English semi-cylinder turbine. Watch this video to find out how it works! The arrows are a representation of the wind flowing into the turbine.
2.Assembly:
First, create the car that you want to power. I’ve included example cars for you to build off of. Second, set up your box fan or
hair dryer to blow your WindSprinter down a (long) hallway. Lastly, get your friends together and have fun racing!!
3.Modification
If you find that your WindSprinter doesn’t have enough torque or is too big for your car, then you can use the HighTorqueTurbine file or the CompactTurbine file instead. If you want to go even higher torque(or even smaller!), go into the Turbine.ipt and open up Parameters. At the bottom, under User Parameters, there are 3 dimensions you can change: Diameter, Intake, and Length. Diameter changes the diameter of the Turbine (the default is 1.5). Intake (indirectly) changes the size of the intake(default is .15). Higher Intake values will create bigger intakes. Length is the length of the whole turbine(default is 2.5). Note: Edit Diameter before Intake if you are making it bigger, inverse if smaller.
Can be mounted vertically.
Follow the pictures below to make one of the two example cars that are powered by the WindSprinter. The first one is a simple Base for you to add anything onto. The second one is much slower but higher torque. It’s a modification to the Base. For the second one (OffRoader), I recommend using the HighTorqueTurbine. I printed these WindSprinters with HdGlass at these settings:
Layer Height – .1mm
Shell Thickness – .8mm
Infill – 100%
Print Speed – 50mm/s
Support – None
10 line Brim
.4mm nozzle diameter
You can download the Inventor file by following this link to my Thingiverse page and clicking on the Thing Files Tab an select the Turbine.ipt file: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:953001/#files
I created the above animation by moving my Inventor file into Blender and then animating it as you see here. The arrows indicate the wind interaction with the turbine. The rendering was done by Daytona one of our good friends and creative team members. The music was added by Daytona as well and is by Audio Market.
Assembling the basic model:
Make On!