Flutter analysis of composite flexible wind turbine blades
Ren Yong-sheng1; Du Xiang-hong1; Yang Shu-lian2
1. College of Mechanical and Electronic Engineering, Shandong University of Science &Technology Qindao, China, 266510; 2. Shandong Institute of Business and Technology Yantai, China, 2664005
Abstract：Wind turbine blades are flexible structures that can often be modeled as anisotropic composite thin-walled beams, exhibiting bending-twist coupling. The equations of motion for a single wind turbine blade are derived using Hamilton’s principle and a variational-asymptotical method(VAM). The structural model includes anisotropy, warping function, centrifugal loads, precone and pretwist angle. The aerodynamic loads are determined based on blade element momentum (BEM) theory and quasi-steady airfoil aerodynamics. The Galerkin’s method is employed in order to solve the coupled differential equations. Aeroelastic stability is investigated through eigenvalue analysis. Numerical results are obtained for the blades with Circumferentially Antisymmetric Stiffness (CAS) configuration, the effects of the fiber orientation, pretwist angle and inflow on blade aeroelastic stability are investigated.
2011, Vol. 30 
