Effect of plunging amplitude on the performance of a wind turbine blade section

Abstract

In many engineering applications (e.g. helicopters, turbines, compressors), lifting surfaces experience unsteady motion or are perturbed by unsteady incoming flows. Horizontal axis wind turbine rotors experience large time dependent variations in angle-of-attack as a result of control input angles, blade flapping, structural response and wake inflow. In addition, the blade sections encounter substantial periodic variations in local velocity and sweep angle. Thus, the unsteady aerodynamic behaviour of the blade sections must be properly understood to enable accurate predictions of the air loads and aero elastic response of the rotor system.