Multiple wall connection over piers
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Solution Overview
Problem
Traditional solar tracker designs require increased material and weight to reduce torque tube deflections, leading to higher costs and energy consumption due to the need for larger diameter and thicker torque tubes across their entire length, rather than just at high load areas near piers.
Innovation Solution
A solar tracker system with a torque tube featuring a double wall thickness area centered on piers, achieved through sectioned construction with swaged portions or a sleeve insertion, and wall reinforcement using doubler plates with U-bolts to enhance stiffness only where needed, allowing for reduced overall tube thickness and diameter.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Stability of the object's composition
If the torque tube is made with increased material and weight across its entire length, then deflections are reduced, but material usage and costs increase
Solution Approach 1:
The torque tube is designed with non-uniform wall thickness, featuring a first wall thickness at high load areas (over piers) and a second, reduced wall thickness at low load areas (between piers). This local differentiation allows the structure to have sufficient stiffness where needed while minimizing material usage in regions where deflection control is less critical.
Solution Approach 2:
The torque tube is divided into multiple sections with different wall thickness characteristics. The tube includes high load area sections with greater wall thickness positioned over piers, and low load area sections with reduced wall thickness between piers. This segmentation allows optimized material distribution according to the structural load profile.
2Strength
If the torque tube diameter and thickness are increased across the entire length, then stiffness is improved, but the overall tracker size and weight increase
Solution Approach 1:
The torque tube implements local quality enhancement by providing increased wall thickness only at high load areas where stiffness is most needed to resist bending moments from solar panel loads. The reduced wall thickness at low load areas decreases the overall weight of the moving tracker structure while maintaining adequate stiffness where it matters most for structural integrity.
3Stability of the object's composition
If larger diameter and thicker torque tubes are used, then deflection resistance is improved, but energy consumption increases
Solution Approach 1:
By concentrating the torque tube's thickness and stiffness enhancement only at high load areas over piers, the design minimizes the overall mass of the moving tracker structure. This reduced mass directly decreases the energy required for the tracker to move and reposition throughout the day, while still providing adequate deflection resistance where structural loads are highest.
Data Source
AI summary
A solar tracker including at least one pair of piers configured to be secured in the ground and defining a span between the pair, a bearing supported on the pier, and a torque tube supported in the bearing such that the bearing enables rotation of the torque tube, the torque tube including a double wall thickness area, wherein the double wall thickness area limits deflection of the torque tube along the span.