Assessment on UV ageing of photopolymerizable resin repaired GFRPs for wind turbine blades

Abstract

The photopolymerizable resin repair method was investigated for the high altitude location and harsh remediation condition of wind turbine blades, because of its short operation time and low equipment requirement. This paper demonstrates the durability under ultraviolet (UV) irradiation environment of a photo- or thermal-polymerizable resin repaired GFRP, which is the essential material for manufacturing wind turbine blades. During the experiments, the fundamental GFRP specimens fabricated by wet prepreg manufacture technique were pre-damaged, and then repaired by attaching external photo- or thermal-polymerizable resin-impregnated glass fabric patches, followed by UV curing and room temperature (RT) curing, respectively. Long-term UV ageing (over 1300 h) was conducted to repaired specimens by employing a 365 nm wavelength UV lamp. The mechanical properties, thermal properties and surface morphology were evaluated before and after ageing. The results revealed that the UV cured specimens have better mechanical properties and stability compared to RT cured specimens in UV ageing environments.