Thinking of making a wind generator system and producing power for your home so you can UNPLUG from the grid?

While Home Power Magazine may not be able to help with your wind power solutions, they do have one of the largest selections of solar panels and conservation gear on Earth.

If you would like to receive a copy of our CD class in downloaded format - free - Email Ian, their Editor and ask him if he is willing to carry the WindGenZen class on their site for subscribers to download.

Home Power Magazine has been in business since 1987 - 20 years now - and is up to issue #113 (as of May, 2006). Try to find an article on a large, practical, build-it-yourself wind generator...good luck.

We used the 'search past articles' at their website (results belows) to find:

  • "Home made wind power" - zero results.

  • "Home made wind generator" - zero results.

  • "Do it yourself wind generator" - 1 result - a useless wooden contraption.

  • "Wind Generator plans" - 3 results, the useless wooden contraption, a 'guide' to wind genrator plans and nothing in the article headings for the third result that would indicate anything in that issue relating to home made, powerful, uesable wind power.

  • We did find a link back to eduhosting.org for the free basic class on carving a prop with no twist and we appreciate that. We're hoping someday they let their readers download the entire course from their site.

If you are seeking solar, there are a lot of solar PV ads flashing around the screen, and if you do the search yourself, and look at page after page, article after article, the only way the folks at Home Power Magazine know how to generate power seems to be with solar PV panels. Hmmmm...and Ian is a pretty smart cookie and know how to build wind generators - hopefully someday he'll write an article on the topic for his magazine.

This is The Magazine to teach folks how to UNPLUG TODAY! Let's read their mission statement by visiting the ABOUT page:

The Home Power Crew:
Meet the folks who make Home Power happen.

In our humble beginnings, Home Power was out to fill an information void for users and would-be users of home-made electricity. Nowadays, we've made it our business to serve up the entire array of sensible, available, renewable energy technologies, educating and empowering our readers toward more sustainable lifestyles. Whether you're a renewable energy enthusiast, end-user, or professional, every issue of Home Power delivers pages and pages of fresh information to inform and challenge you.

Home Power contributors range from do-it-yourself homeowners and innovative idealists to licensed electricians and pragmatic policymakers. Look to us for clear, concise articles complemented by color photography, charts, system schematics, illustrations, pricing tables, and availability information.

Subtitled “The Hands-On Journal of Home-Made Power,” Home Power has been published bimonthly since 1987 and is available by subscription and on newsstands in the U.S. , Canada , and beyond. HP content, renewable energy information and books, back issues, CD-ROMs, videos, T-shirts, etc. are all available here on our Web site.

Features and topics
• System installation profiles

  • How to build your own...”
  • How to buy a...”
  • Book and product reviews
  • On and off-grid systems
  • Electric and alternative fuel vehicles
  • Future technologies and business
  • Residential, commercial, and mobile
  • Reader letters and questions
  • History, politics, and education
  • Developing world applications
  • Events and happenings
  • And much more!

Technologies covered
• Solar electricity

  • Wind turbines
  • Microhydro power
  • Batteries and chargers
  • Inverters and system controls
  • Home heating and cooling
  • Solar water heating
  • Appliances and home efficiency
  • Water pumping
  • Green building
  • Solar home design
  • Transportation and biofuels
  • And much more!

Well, they say they cover 'how to build your own' so there's hope.

They say they cover 'wind generators' - which must mean the ones you can't build.

And they say the cover 'developing world applications' - perhaps that means home built wind power isn't considered a developing technology.

Let's check their education pages - maybe we will have better luck...nope...just wind maps and data which are found at most alternative energy sites.

So we offered to GIVE the magazine a free comprehensive class on carving a prop from wood, finding a generator, erecting a tower, battery system, inverter, switches, the whole nine yards, all the way up to building three or four 12 foot wind generators that would take their readers off the grid permanently.

They were kind enough to link back to us and we suggest you visit them and browse their large selection of solar panels and conservation gear.

HINT: solar panels cost 20 times more per amp than a garage built wind generator system, so if you want to be able to afford all that solar PV, you'll can pay for it with wind power...easily.

Below are screen shots of our searches. Go there and see if you do better. We'd like to know.

A DIFFERENT magazine below seems to be carrying articles to promote home-built wind power. We have faith that someday Home Power Magazine will too. Ian is a pretty nice guy and knows a lot, but it seems like it is going to take a crowbar before we get them to run an article on building a large, nice, easy to make WindGenZen rig in your garage.


The links below are NOT from Home Power - they are here at windgenzen.com.

These are only the most popular links - there are a half dozen (more) classes on carving wind gen blades, large and small, from circuits to towers, mounts for as little as $25.00 with hardware store parts and gorgeous, affordable monolith towers you can afford.