variable speed & load generator

[lightningph]

I'm working on designing a device to keep tension on a moving line of wire. The tension (amount of force pulling back on the wire) needs to be able to be adjusted and the speed will vary. Right now we have dc motors w/ power to them creating the tension for us. I'd like to instead generate electricity to put back on the grid w/ them. Do you know of any generator systems that have the capability of changing both the shaft speed and load the load it takes? Thanks

 

[sreid]

Either a Brushless Motor/Servo Amplifier or an Induction Motor/Vector Drive would do this. One way is to run it in velocity mode for speed control and set the current limit to control the maximum torque. Drives are available (usually in larger sizes) that regenerate to the AC Line.