"Mark and Kim Smith" wrote in message
...
I don't remember the angles. I calculated them some time ago and the
papers are buried somewhere in my archives.

180 - 360/N I think. The problem I see is picking wood wide enough cover the
wood around the rim, but not so wide as to waste a lot.

I did biscuit and glue them. They are also held together by the screws on
each spoke. Hmmm, 8 joints into 360 = 45 degrees. That sound about
right?? I biscuited and glued two pieces for each section, attached each
section to another with biscuits and glue, attached the spokes
temporarily, marked center then made a jig to cut the outer diameter with
my bandsaw. Marked the orientation of the spokes, removed them, measured
the height I wanted the side wall to be, then used a jigsaw to cut the
inside diameter. Reattached the spokes. Installed the paddles with
screws. Installed the bucket bottoms with screws. Since there were so
many slats for the bucket bottoms, I don't think I calculated the angle.
I took a couple of samples and fudged the angle on my table saw. Just got
'em close enough. Figured the water would make them swell and it didn't
hurt to have a little water dripping through. Turned out I was right.

The one place I saw that makes them just bolts the 8 rim pieces to the
spokes, but it's a little hard to tell. The plans I have don't call for
angling the slats at all, just bevelling the buckets.


For bearings, I got some pillow block bearings from McMaster. I used a 1
1/4" steel rod for the shaft. It is about 7' long. It's weight is a bit
of a counter balance for the wheel. The wheel is about 12" wide, so the
first bearing is about 18" from the outside of the wheel. The other
bearing is about 6' from the outside of the wheel. The wheel is held to
the shaft with some 1 1/4" I.D. collars that I also got from McMaster.
Weight is not an issue.

Thanks, this really helps. Although my wheel house will only be a little
over 2' wide, so I'll have to weigh it down accordingly.

Looks can be deceiving!! The wheel house is only 6' tall. It's foot
print is 6' x 6'. The footings are 6' by 4' and some change. The wheel
itself is only 4' tall. The house is just big enough to fit two barrel
filters, some valving and some lighting timers.

My 2000 gph pump actually deposits the water, through the filters, into
the sluice. It runs 24/7. When I need to top off the pond, I turn on a
remote valve which runs water over the wheel. I'm sure, if you want to,
you could valve a portion of your water over your wheel. The only way I
could have done that was pre-filter, off of the pressure side. I didn't
want to do that. Only a very small trickle is needed to get the water
wheel effect going. My pond page 5 shows a lot of this construction. In
fact, if you look in this pic: http://www.bunchobikes.com/pond102.jpg You
can see where the 2" outputs from the filter pour into the sluice. Way
before the wheel was built.

I see you're running your filters in parallel? What sort of filter media are
you using? My pond 'upgrade' is happening til the spring (we've already had
frost here), so I'm just planning the filter and getting ready to build the
wheel over the winter.