Following the wrong instructions is a sure-fire way to send your project into disaster. Save your money by doing it right the first time. Sure, you can spend hours online, sifting through pages of questionable quality. Still there is no way of telling if you have all the resources you need or if a vitally important detail is missing. Why follow plans drafted by a hobbyist when you can get a step-by-step manual created by a professional engineer?
DIY manuals take the guesswork out of building a windmill and getting the electrical rig working. Everything is included to step you through the process from start to finish. Whether you prefer to learn from diagrams, text or videos, it is all there for your reference as you build.
There are no doubt plenty of mediocre guides out there, so let’s take a look at the top three products. Some have strong sections about wind power while other packages are directed towards people that mainly want to build solar panels. In this case, the rating score is heavily based on how good the wind turbine resources are.
Earth4Energy
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Earth4Energy is a step-by-step guide to making 500 watt wind turbines and 100 watt solar panels. The plans are easy to follow as it is written without much jargon or terminology. The ebook portion has plenty of diagrams and photos to help you along the way. Earth4Energy has the strongest materials on building a wind turbine project. The included videos are a key part of the wind project guide, making it ideal for people who like to learn visually. On the solar end, the video instructions aren’t as well developed as the other two so check out GreenDIYEnergy if you want to focus on solar panels. For those looking for the best guide to build a windmill with, Earth4Energy is my top recommendation.
Home Made Energy
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Homemade Energy aims to please with both the solar and wind power sections. This is a good all-in-one solution. Bill Ford teaches you how to make 100 watt solar panels and 1,000 watt wind turbines using blades that are 8 feet in diameter, running at speeds of around 20 miles per hour. The solar guide includes a big collection of videos with detailed information but the picture quality isn’t as sharp as the others. All together there are about four hours of video. The wind turbine guide doesn’t include video like Earth4Energy but then again neither does GreenDIYEnergy. If you’re looking to take on both a solar and wind project and would rather follow one guide, Homemade Energy is a solid choice.
GreenDIYenergy
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GreenDIYEnergy does a great job of focusing on DIY solar panel construction. The videos are the best of the bunch with crisp, high resolution footage. A NABCEP certified electrician is your guide. It includes 9 design manuals with hundreds of pages of content, 7 video components and spreadsheets to make the calculations easy. There are 4 manuals dedicated to building solar panels, which can be made for about $100, and also a windmill for around $140. The main flaw with this package is that the turbine section isn’t very big. Since most readers here are mainly interested in wind power, this takes the third spot.