• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.36 no.8
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• pp.905-911
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• 2012

To establish a floating offshore wind turbine simulation model, a tension leg platform is added to an onshore wind turbine. The wind load is calculated by using meteorological administration data and a power law that defines the wind velocity according to the height from the sea surface. The wind load is applied to the blade and wind tower at a regular distance. The relative Morison equation is employed to generate the wave load. The rated rotor speed (18 rpm) is applied to the hub as a motion. The dynamic behavior of a 2-MW floating offshore wind turbine subjected to the wave excitation and wind load is analyzed. The flexible effects of the wind tower and the blade are analyzed. The flexible model of the wind tower and blade is established to examine the natural frequency of the TLP-type offshore wind turbine. To study the effect of the flexible tower and blade on the floating offshore wind turbine, we modeled the flexible tower model and flexible tower-blade model and compared it with a rigid model.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2005.05b
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• pp.130-134
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• 2005

The objectives of this study are to improve the aerodynamics performance on the down-wind blade system with folding type blade which consists of the folding type rotor blade, wind vane yawing stabilizer and a bevel gearbox. The aerodynamics performance for the new wind turbine system are compared with those of the conventional up-wind blade system. In addition to, a novel multi voltage inverter system is applied for reductions of harmonic.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Precision Engineering
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• v.30 no.9
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• pp.969-975
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• 2013

As energy shortage is getting more serious, wind energy source is more promoted around the world. Blade is a key component of wind turbine. Local breakages and/or contamination in the blade bring degradation in aerodynamic efficiency and life-time. However, it is not easy and even dangerous for human workers to access the blade for inspection and maintenance since its size is huge and located at high mountains and rough sea, which are windy places. This paper deals with a novel moving mechanism that efficiently carries human workers or robots to the wind turbine blade. The proposed mechanism utilizes flexible tube with pressurized air that rolls and climbs over the blade surface. So, the tube naturally adapts the changing surface of the blade and acts no harm to it. This paper discusses about its concept, detail design, and advantages. The feasibility of the proposed mechanism is proved through experiments prototype.

• Ocean Systems Engineering
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.95-111
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• 2011

Increasing numbers of floating offshore wind turbines are planned and designed these days due to their high potential in massive generation of clean energy from water depth deeper than 50 m. In the present study, a numerical prediction tool has been developed for the fully-coupled dynamic analysis of FOWTs in time domain including aero-blade-tower dynamics and control, mooring dynamics, and platform motions. In particular, the focus of the present study is paid to the dynamic coupling between the rotor and floater and the coupled case is compared against the uncoupled case so that their dynamic coupling effects can be identified. For this purpose, a mono-column mini TLP with 1.5MW turbine for 80m water depth is selected as an example. The time histories and spectra of the FOWT motions and accelerations as well as tether top-tensions are presented for the given collinear wind-wave condition. When compared with the uncoupled analysis, both standard deviations and maximum values of the floater-responses/tower-accelerations and tether tensions are appreciably increased as a result of the rotor-floater dynamic coupling, which may influence the overall design including fatigue-life estimation especially when larger blades are to be used.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Precision Engineering
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• v.29 no.11
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• pp.1236-1244
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• 2012

A equivalent stiffness modeling has been performed for extracting the equivalent stiffness properties which are orthotropic elastic model from a large scale wind turbine rotor blade so that structure model can be constructed more simply for the three dimensional static aeroelastic analysis. In order to present the procedure of equivalent stiffness modeling, NREL 5MW class wind turbine rotor having the three stiffness information which are flapewise, edgewise and torsional stiffness was chosen. This method is based on applying unit moment at the tip of the blade as well as fixing all degree of freedom at the blade root and calculating the displacement from the load analysis to obtain the elastic modulus corresponding to equivalent stiffness referred to the NREL reports on blade divided into 5 sections respectively. In addition, one section was divided into 3 parts and the trend functions were used to make the equivalent stiffness model more correctly and quickly. Through the comparison of stiffness between the reference values and calculated values from equivalent stiffness model, the investigation of the accuracy on the stiffness values and the efficiency for constructing the model was conducted.

• International Journal of Fluid Machinery and Systems
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.16-27
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• 2014

Double-blade vertical axis wind turbines (DB-VAWTs) can improve the self-starting performance of lift-driven VAWTs. We here propose the quadruple-multiple streamtube model (QMS), based on the blade element momentum (BEM) theory, for simulating DB-VAWT performance. Model validity is investigated by comparison to computational fluid dynamics (CFD) prediction for two kinds of two-dimensional DB-VAWT rotors for two rotor scales with three inner-outer radius ratios: 0.25, 0.5, and 0.75. The BEM-QMS model does not consider the effects of an inner rotor on the flow speed in the upwind half of the rotor, so we introduce a correction factor for this flow speed. The maximum power coefficient predicted by the modified BEM-QMS model for a DB-VAWT is thus closer to the CFD prediction.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.52 no.3
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• pp.485-505
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• 2014

This study aimed to develop an approach to accurately predict the wind models and wind effects of large wind turbines. The wind-induced vibration characteristics of a 5 MW tower-blade coupled wind turbine system have been investigated in this paper. First, the blade-tower integration model was established, which included blades, nacelle, tower and the base of the wind turbine system. The harmonic superposition method and modified blade element momentum theory were then applied to simulate the fluctuating wind field for the rotor blades and tower. Finally, wind-induced responses and equivalent static wind loads (ESWL) of the system were studied based on the modified consistent coupling method, which took into account coupling effects of resonant modes, cross terms of resonant and background responses. Furthermore, useful suggestions were proposed to instruct the wind resistance design of large wind turbines. Based on obtained results, it is shown from the obtained results that wind-induced responses and ESWL were characterized with complicated modal responses, multi-mode coupling effects, and multiple equivalent objectives. Compared with the background component, the resonant component made more contribution to wind-induced responses and equivalent static wind loads at the middle-upper part of the tower and blades, and cross terms between background and resonant components affected the total fluctuation responses, while the background responses were similar with the resonant responses at the bottom of tower.

• New & Renewable Energy
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• v.4 no.3
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• pp.45-50
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• 2008

GFRP based composite rotor blades were developed for 750 kW & 2 MW wind turbines. The blade sectional geometry was designed to have a general shell-spar and shear web structure. For verifying the structural safety under all relevant extreme loads specified in the GL guidelines, the structural analysis of the rotor blades was performed using commercial FEM codes. The static load carrying capacity, blade tip deflections and natural frequencies were evaluated to satisfy the strength and stability requirements. Full-scale proof tests of rotor blades were carried out with optical fiber sensors for real-time condition monitoring. Finally, the prototype of each rotor blade passed all proof tests for GL certification.

• Wind and Structures
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• v.35 no.3
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• pp.147-155
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• 2022

This research proposes a wind-lens turbine design that can startup and operate at a low wind speed (< 5m/s). The performance of the wind-lens turbine was investigated using CFD and wind tunnel testing. The wind-lens turbine consists of a 3-bladed horizontal axis wind turbine with a diameter of 0.6m and a diffuser-shaped shroud that uses the suction side of the thin airfoil SD2030 as a cross-section profile. The performance of the 3-bladed wind-lens turbine was then compared to the two-bladed rotor configuration while keeping the blade geometry the same. The 3-bladed wind-lens turbine successfully startup at 1m/s and produced a torque of 66% higher than the bare turbine, while the two-bladed wind-lens turbine startup at less than 4m/s and produced a torque of 186 % higher than the two-bladed bare turbine at the design point. Findings testify that adding the wind-lens could improve the bare turbine's performance at low wind speed.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
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• v.35 no.10
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• pp.884-890
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• 2007

The procedure for the aerodynamic design of the rotor blades for 10 kW-level HAWT (horizontal axis wind turbine) has been investigated to be practiced systematically. The approximately optimal shape was designed using an inverse method based on the momentum theory and the blade element method. The configuration was tested in the wind tunnel of the Korea Air Force Academy, and the data was compared with those obtained from the real system manufactured from the present design. From this research, the authors established the systematic technolo for wind turbine blades, and set up the technical procedure which can be extended for the future design of middle and large sized wind turbines.