Wind Turbine Spar Cap Segmented Laminate Design
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Solution Overview
Problem
The manufacturing of large spar caps for wind turbine blades faces challenges such as maintaining required tolerances, tedious and ineffective moulding processes, potential damage during demoulding, wrinkle formation, and unsatisfactory resin impregnation or air pockets, which affect stiffness and buckling resistance.
Innovation Solution
A spar cap design featuring a primary laminate with a secondary laminate overlapping it, both embedded in a polymer matrix, allowing for increased stiffness and buckling resistance without exceeding maximum laminate thickness, and an offline moulding method to reduce cycle time and improve infusion quality.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If pultruded fibrous strips are used for reinforcement, then manufacturing flexibility and length adaptability are improved, but manufacturing complexity and process difficulty increase
Solution Approach 1:
The spar cap is divided into multiple sections (root section, body section, tip section) with different structural requirements. Each section can be manufactured separately using pultrusion and then assembled together, allowing length adaptability while reducing the complexity of manufacturing the entire structure as a single piece.
Solution Approach 2:
The pultruded fibrous strips are pre-formed and prepared before being integrated into the shell halves. This preliminary preparation allows the reinforcement elements to be ready for assembly, reducing the complexity of the overall manufacturing process while maintaining flexibility in length configuration.
2Ease of manufacture
If known spar cap moulding methods are used, then spar cap formation is achieved, but manufacturing time and process efficiency increase
Solution Approach 1:
The spar cap manufacturing process is merged with the shell moulding process. The pultruded fibrous strips are integrated into the shell halves during the same moulding operation, allowing simultaneous formation of both the shell and spar cap reinforcement structures. This eliminates separate manufacturing steps and reduces total production time.
Solution Approach 2:
The pultruded fibrous strips are prepared and positioned in the mould before the shell moulding process begins. This preliminary placement ensures that the reinforcement structures are already in position when the shell is formed, eliminating the need for separate spar cap installation steps and reducing overall manufacturing time.
3Ease of manufacture
If known moulding processes are used, then spar cap formation is achieved, but manufacturing precision and tolerance control worsen
Solution Approach 1:
The spar cap is segmented into multiple sections (root, body, tip) that can be manufactured and positioned separately within the shell halves. This segmentation allows for better control of dimensions and tolerances in each section, as each can be optimized independently rather than requiring precision across the entire length in a single moulding operation.
Solution Approach 2:
The pultruded fibrous strips serve as intermediary reinforcement elements that are integrated between the shell halves. These pre-formed strips provide a stable base structure that helps maintain tolerances during the moulding process, as they are already dimensionally stable before being incorporated into the final structure.
4Ease of manufacture
If known moulding processes are used, then spar cap formation is achieved, but structural integrity and resin impregnation quality worsen
Solution Approach 1:
The spar cap reinforcement structures are merged with the shell moulding process, allowing the same resin infusion system to simultaneously impregnate both the shell and the pultruded fibrous strips. This unified approach ensures consistent resin distribution and impregnation quality across all components, eliminating the risks associated with separate manufacturing processes.
Solution Approach 2:
The pultruded fibrous strips act as intermediary elements that are already pre-impregnated or ready for resin infusion during the shell moulding process. This intermediary role ensures that the reinforcement structures receive adequate resin impregnation as part of the overall moulding cycle, improving reliability without requiring separate treatment steps.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The design enhances stiffness and buckling resistance while reducing manufacturing time and minimizing resin impregnation issues, enabling more efficient production of wind turbine blades with improved structural integrity.
Implementation Method 1
a primary laminate comprising a plurality of first fibre layers embedded in a first polymer matrix
Implementation Method 2
unsatisfactory resin impregnation or air pockets formed during known moulding processes
Data Source
AI summary
A spar cap for a wind turbine blade, comprising a load-carrying structure including a primary laminate and a secondary laminate arranged with an overlap in a longitudinal axis of the spar cap, wherein the width of the secondary laminate being at least 1.1 times greater than the width of the primary laminate.