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Small Firm Wows Nasa With "unique" Process

 

Making windmills should be easy, right? So when NASA decided to develop a wind-powered turbine for generating electricity, it gave the contract to Lockheed Corp. Lockheed made four pairs of blades, each one more expensive than its predecessor, but they kept failing under stress. So NASA gave up on Lockheed's blades.

NASA turned to tiny Gougeon Brothers Inc. of Bay City, Mich. The three brothers -- Meade, Joe, and Jan -- suggested making the blades with the wood-composite technicues they had developed in building boats.

The Gougeons' method of making blades, with 72 layers of epoxy-laminated fir, turned out to be not only better, but cheaper. One set is still going strong in Hawaii after 4,000 hours; NASA fatigue tests indicate it will last 30 years. The Gougeons have just landed a contract to design 200-foot-long blades for a General Electric windmill. But there's still some stigma attached to their company's smallness, the brothers say.

"They look at us as a bit of a pimple," Meade comments. "Fortunately, we're in a technology they haven't the foggiest notion of. What we do is unique, so they're forced to deal with us even though they don't understand us."