scholarly journals Enhancement of Free Vortex Filament Method for Aerodynamic Loads on Rotor Blades

2017 ◽  
Vol 139 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Hamidreza Abedi ◽  
Lars Davidson ◽  
Spyros Voutsinas

The aerodynamics of a wind turbine is governed by the flow around the rotor, where the prediction of air loads on rotor blades in different operational conditions and its relation to rotor structural dynamics is one of the most important challenges in wind turbine rotor blade design. Because of the unsteady flow field around wind turbine blades, prediction of aerodynamic loads with high level of accuracy is difficult and increases the uncertainty of load calculations. An in-house vortex lattice free wake (VLFW) code, based on the inviscid, incompressible, and irrotational flow (potential flow), was developed to study the aerodynamic loads. Since it is based on the potential flow, it cannot be used to predict viscous phenomena such as drag and boundary layer separation. Therefore, it must be coupled to tabulated airfoil data to take the viscosity effects into account. Additionally, a dynamic approach must be introduced to modify the aerodynamic coefficients for unsteady operating conditions. This approach, which is called dynamic stall, adjusts the lift, the drag, and the moment coefficients for each blade element on the basis of the two-dimensional (2D) static airfoil data together with the correction for separated flow. Two different turbines, NREL and MEXICO, are used in the simulations. Predicted normal and tangential forces using the VLFW method are compared with the blade element momentum (BEM) method, the GENUVP code, and the MEXICO wind tunnel measurements. The results show that coupling to the 2D static airfoil data improves the load and power predictions while employing the dynamic stall model to take the time-varying operating conditions into consideration is crucial.

Author(s):  
Hamidreza Abedi ◽  
Lars Davidson ◽  
Spyros Voutsinas

The aerodynamics of a wind turbine is governed by the flow around the rotor, where the prediction of air loads on rotor blades in different operational conditions and its relation to rotor structural dynamics is one of the most important challenges in wind turbine rotor blade design. Because of the unsteady flow field around wind turbine blades, prediction of aerodynamic loads with high level of accuracy is difficult and increases the uncertainty of load calculations. A free vortex wake method, based on the potential, inviscid and irrotational flow, is developed to study the aerodynamic loads. Since it is based on the potential, inviscid and irrotational flow, it cannot be used to predict viscous phenomena such as drag and boundary layer separation. Therefore it must be coupled to the tabulated airfoil data to take the viscosity effects into account. The results are compared with the Blade Element Momentum (BEM) [1] method and the GENUVP code [2] (see also the acknowledgments).


Author(s):  
Ibtissem Barkat ◽  
Abdelouahab Benretem ◽  
Fawaz Massouh ◽  
Issam Meghlaoui ◽  
Ahlem Chebel

This article aims to study the forces applied to the rotors of horizontal axis wind turbines. The aerodynamics of a turbine are controlled by the flow around the rotor, or estimate of air charges on the rotor blades under various operating conditions and their relation to the structural dynamics of the rotor are critical for design. One of the major challenges in wind turbine aerodynamics is to predict the forces on the blade as various methods, including blade element moment theory (BEM), the approach that is naturally adapted to the simulation of the aerodynamics of wind turbines and the dynamic and models (CFD) that describes with fidelity the flow around the rotor. In our article we proposed a modeling method and a simulation of the forces applied to the horizontal axis wind rotors turbines using the application of the blade elements method to model the rotor and the vortex method of free wake modeling in order to develop a rotor model, which can be used to study wind farms. This model is intended to speed up the calculation, guaranteeing a good representation of the aerodynamic loads exerted by the wind.


Author(s):  
M. R. Luhur ◽  
J. Peinke ◽  
M. Kühn ◽  
M. Wächter

The paper presents a stochastic approach to estimate the aerodynamic forces with local dynamics on wind turbine blades in unsteady wind inflow. This is done by integrating a stochastic model of lift and drag dynamics for an airfoil into the aerodynamic simulation software AeroDyn. The model is added as an alternative to the static table lookup approach in blade element momentum (BEM) wake model used by AeroDyn. The stochastic forces are obtained for a rotor blade element using full field turbulence simulated wind data input and compared with the classical BEM and dynamic stall models for identical conditions. The comparison shows that the stochastic model generates additional extended dynamic response in terms of local force fluctuations. Further, the comparison of statistics between the classical BEM, dynamic stall, and stochastic models' results in terms of their increment probability density functions (PDFs) gives consistent results.


Author(s):  
Jinge Chen ◽  
Xin Shen ◽  
Xiaocheng Zhu ◽  
Zhaohui Du

Along with the upscaling tendency, lighter and so more flexible wind turbine blades are introduced for reducing cost of manufacture and materials. The flexible blade deforms under aerodynamic loads and in turn affects the flow field, arising the aero-elastic problems. In this paper, the impact of blade flexibility on the wind turbine loads, power production, and pitch actions is discussed. An aeroelastic model is developed for the study. A free wake vortex lattice model is used to calculate the aerodynamic loads, and a geometrically exact beam theory is adopted to compute the structural dynamics of the blade. The flap, lead-lag bending and torsion DOFs are all included and nonlinear effects due to large deflections are considered. The NREL 5MW reference wind turbine is analyzed. Influences of pure-bending and bending-torsion deformations of the blade on aerodynamic loads are compared. The aerodynamic force distributions under various wind speeds for rigid and flexible blades are also compared. The steady state deformations across the operational conditions are calculated, along with the rotor power production. Significant reduction of power is seen especially under large wind speeds, due to the blade twist deformations under torsion moments. Lower pitch angle settings should be applied to maintain the constant power.


2019 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 115-126
Author(s):  
Balázs Gáti ◽  
Tamás Gausz

Rotor blades of an autorotating helicopter or a gyrocopter work very similar to the rotor blades of a wind turbine in skew wind. In this publication we present the result of multiple analysis of a rotor blade of a rotary-wing airplane, but the analyses were performed with a software package developed for investigation of wind turbine blades. The results of several analyses seem to be valid for rotary-wing airplanes in some special, but very important cases, and can be useful for more detailed investigation. It was stated, that the fact leads to uninterpretable numerical solutions, that the angle between the undisturbed airflow and the Tip Path Plane is much lower in case of helicopters and gyrocopters than by wind turbines in most operational conditions .


2021 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Moutaz Elgammi ◽  
Aljonid Aokaly ◽  
Yasser Aldali

Abstract A significant amount of work is performed on various aerofoil profiles to improve their characteristics for wind turbine applications. The main purpose is to increase the power output of wind turbines by increasing the lift-to-drag ratio of the aerofoil blade sections. However, most of the developed aerofoil profiles work well only at their design angles of attack and for low Reynolds numbers with a very dramatic stall that could significantly influence the characteristics of the aerofoil profiles and the performance of wind turbines. The present paper is conducted to develop a new aerofoil profile with more gradual stall characteristics that works efficiently for different operational conditions (clean and rough working conditions) similar to those encountered by wind turbines in the free environment. The new aerofoil profile was developed based on a combination between experimental Box–Behnken design and XFOIL code, measurements, and 2D simulation conducted by computational fluid dynamics (CFD) method. The established aerofoil can be used for wind turbine blades because it gives high lift-to-drag-ratios with very smooth and gradual stall characteristics even under very rough operating conditions.


Energies ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 654 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chengyong Zhu ◽  
Tongguang Wang ◽  
Jianghai Wu

Passive vortex generators (VGs) are widely used to suppress the flow separation of wind turbine blades, and hence, to improve rotor performance. VGs have been extensively investigated on stationary airfoils; however, their influence on unsteady airfoil flow remains unclear. Thus, we evaluated the unsteady aerodynamic responses of the DU-97-W300 airfoil with and without VGs undergoing pitch oscillations, which is a typical motion of the turbine unsteady operating conditions. The airfoil flow is simulated by numerically solving the unsteady Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes equations with fully resolved VGs. Numerical modelling is validated by good agreement between the calculated and experimental data with respect to the unsteady-uncontrolled flow under pitch oscillations, and the steady-controlled flow with VGs. The dynamic stall of the airfoil was found to be effectively suppressed by VGs. The lift hysteresis intensity is greatly decreased, i.e., by 72.7%, at moderate unsteadiness, and its sensitivity to the reduced frequency is favorably reduced. The influences of vane height and chordwise installation are investigated on the unsteady aerodynamic responses as well. In a no-stall flow regime, decreasing vane height and positioning VGs further downstream can lead to relatively high effectiveness. Compared with the baseline VG geometry, the smaller VGs can decrease the decay exponent of nondimensionalized peak vorticity by almost 0.02, and installation further downstream can increase the aerodynamic pitch damping by 0.0278. The obtained results are helpful to understand the dynamic stall control by means of conventional VGs and to develop more effective VG designs for both steady and unsteady wind turbine airfoil flow.


Author(s):  
S. Schreck ◽  
M. Robinson

As wind turbines continue to grow larger, problems associated with adverse aerodynamic loads will grow more critical. Thus, the wind energy technical community has begun to seriously consider the potential of aerodynamic control methodologies for mitigating adverse aerodynamic loading. Spatial and temporal attributes of the structures and processes present in these flow fields hold important implications for active aerodynamic control methodologies currently being contemplated for wind turbine applications. The current work uses complementary experimental and computational methodologies, to isolate and characterize key attributes of blade flow fields associated with axisymmetric and yawed turbine operation. During axisymmetric operation, a highly three-dimensional, shear layer dominated flow field yields rotational augmentation of both mean and standard deviation levels of aerodynamic forces. Under yawed operating conditions, pseudo-sinusoidal inflow angle oscillations elicit dynamic stall, which significantly intensifies aerodynamic load production. Both rotationally augmented and dynamically stalled flows possess attributes likely to pose central challenges for turbine flow control. Whether active control of turbine aerodynamics can help alleviate adverse aerodynamic loads will depend on comprehension and command of the issues documented herein.


Author(s):  
Xiaomin Chen ◽  
Ramesh Agarwal

It is well established that the power generated by a Horizontal-Axis Wind Turbine (HAWT) is a function of the number of blades B, the tip speed ratio λr (blade tip speed/wind free-stream velocity) and the lift to drag ratio (CL/CD) of the airfoil sections of the blade. The previous studies have shown that Blade Element Momentum (BEM) theory is capable of evaluating the steady-state performance of wind turbines, in particular it can provide a reasonably good estimate of generated power at a given wind speed. However in more realistic applications, wind turbine operating conditions change from time to time due to variations in wind velocity and the aerodynamic forces change to new steady-state values after the wake settles to a new equilibrium whenever changes in operating conditions occur. The goal of this paper is to modify the quasi-steady BEM theory by including a simple dynamic inflow model to capture the unsteady behavior of wind turbines on a larger time scale. The output power of the wind turbines is calculated using the improved BEM method incorporating the inflow model. The computations are performed for the original NREL Phase II and Phase III turbines and the Risoe turbine all employing the S809 airfoil section for the turbine blades. It is shown by a simple example that the improved BEM theory is capable of evaluating the wind turbine performance in practical situations where operating conditions often vary in time.


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