Looking for anemometer help

[Windy city]

I have a salvaged ships anemometer that spins very freely and I assume is fully functional. I am going to fabricate a pole for it and would like to utilize it as it was intended to be used. Does anyone have any experience with these and might be able to walk me through testing it? Also any ideas as how to hook it up to a gauge to take readings?

 

[rwm]

That's cool!

 

[tq60]

An ohmeter is needed.

Guessing...

The 3 yellow are likely the direction, these are often a simple pot that has full rotation.

2 wires should be some fixed resistance, the other should be the wiper and change as the direction changes.

The speed can be pulse or energy.

Pulse is usually a simple Reed switch with a magnet in the spinner, ohmeter will show pulses as spun.

Other type has an alternator, simple coil of wire with magnetic armature, think small motor, the spinning creates a sinewave as the rotation.

Faster speed is higher frequency and voltage.



Sent from my SM-G781V using Tapatalk

 

[cathead]

Something to measure DC voltage and AC voltage would also be handy to diagnose how it functions(VOM). If it generates DC voltage, it is likely a small DC generator or it could just as well generate AC. The easiest way might be to
do a little disassembly to see what is inside. If it's modern, it could count pulses. It's a nice piece!

 

[strantor]

Really interesting!

@tq60 you said you are guessing but then used wording like "these are often...", "two wires should be," "pulse is usually," and other things that seem to indicate that you are doing more than just guessing. You sound pretty confident actually. Your guesses sound quite reasonable to me and I am just curious to what degree you are actually guessing or actually not guessing. Do you have experience with nautical anemometers? Are you speaking from experience with anemometers from DIY weather stations? Or are you actually just guessing (confidently)? This is not a challenge, I just want to know if there is room for more guesses or if we already have an expert in the house and I should keep my ideas to myself.

@Windy city do you have an oscilloscope? If not I think a cheap Amazon USB scope will be more than worth the cost for this project.

 

[strantor]

Screw it, I'm just going to throw this out there regardless of whether or not @tq60 already nailed it...

Disclaimer: I have zero experience with nautical anemometers, and only a past interest in DIY weather station anemometers. I am actually just guessing.

An anemometer like that is mission critical and should be designed to never fail. An anemometer like that is going to be designed to serve in the harshest environment conceivable and will be designed with corrosion and natural abuse in mind. Also it looks old so the technology may be arcane. Those facts are what informs my guesses.

If it were many many years ago and if I were tasked with designing an anemometer like that, I would not use a potentiometer for direction. After a couple of days at sea an unsealed potentiometer would be toast. So seal it! But... seals introduce drag, and that drag probably has a nonlinear speed relationship, so will definitely influence both speed and direction readings (speed more so). So I would try to get away without using seals, and my direction and speed measurements would be robust non-contact magnetic/inductive sensors.

For direction I would use one of the following:
RVDT - like a LVDT but measures angular displacement instead of linear position.
Synchro/selsyn.
Resolver.

Unfortunately any of those are going to be very difficult to suss out without supplying an unknown AC voltage.

For speed I would use an inductive pickup. A Reed switch would work too but has moving parts and wears out.

 

[bbobh]

Very cool. It would appear that you have one of these -

https://dmc.daeyang.co.kr:16602/sites/dmc_e/Page/Sub.aspx?MenuCode=7
Have not done a complete search but the documentation I reviewed suggests that the wind speed output (propeller) is indeed pulse and the direction is torque synchro motor. Various display options were/are used. If you go to the mfr site you will likely find a wiring diagram?

 

[SLK001]

My SWAG, is the yellow wires are leads to a generator/alternator that are rectified to DC to give wind speed. The green wires are from a 4 bit resolver to select one of the 16 different directions of a ship:
N
NNE
NE
ENE
E
ESE
SE
SSE
S
... etc.

 

[rwm]

Wow, this is even cooler! Ultrasonic wind speed detector


I did not even know these were a thing!

 

[talvare]

I can't help with the electrical connections, but I also have one of those that I rescued from going to the dumpster many years ago. The electrics have been gutted.
Ted