In-situ solar tracker manufacturing
AssigneeNextpower LLC
InventorsJacob Mark Morin, Abhimanyu Anil Sable, Alexander W. AU
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A method for manufacturing a continuous torque tube of a solar tracking system on site includes the steps of: placing raw material at a rolling apparatus on site; shaping the raw material into torque tube components at the rolling apparatus on site; joining the shaped torque tube components output from the rolling apparatus on site to create a continuous torque tube; and placing solar modules at the continuous torque tube to create a continuous solar tracker row.
Claims20
A method for manufacturing a continuous torque tube of a solar tracking system at a site of the solar tracking system, the method comprising the steps of:
- placing raw material at an input of a rolling apparatus at the site;
- shaping the raw material at the rolling apparatus at the site to create two or more shaped torque tube components from the raw material;
- joining the two or more shaped torque tube components at the site to create the continuous torque tube;
- and
- after joining the two or more shaped torque tube components at the site to create the continuous torque tube, placing one or more solar modules at the continuous torque tube.
A continuous torque tube manufacturing system comprising:
- a rolling apparatus comprising a rolling apparatus input, a rolling apparatus output, and two or more rollers disposed between the rolling apparatus input and the rolling apparatus output, the rolling apparatus configured to receive raw material at the rolling apparatus input and to shape the raw material, using the two or more rollers, into two or more shaped torque tube components;
- and
- a joining apparatus positioned downstream of the rolling apparatus, the joining apparatus comprising a joining apparatus input, a joining apparatus output, and a joining mechanism disposed between the joining apparatus input and the joining apparatus output, the joining apparatus configured to receive and join together the two or more shaped torque tube components to create a continuous torque tube.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.