Effect of Blade Torsion on Modeling Results for the Small Wind Research Turbine (SWRT)

The small wind research turbine (SWRT) testing project was initiated with the goal of better characterizing both small wind turbine loads and dynamic behavior. The main purpose of the testing was to produce high quality data sets for model development and validation and to help the wind industry further their understanding of small wind turbine behavior, including furling. Previous papers have discussed modeling results for the SWRT using the FAST aeroelastic simulator. This paper summarizes modeling results from both the FAST and ADAMS aeroelastic simulators. The ADAMS model allows for blade torsional stiffness to be modeled, which is shown to significantly improve the agreement between model and test results for rotor speed and explain variances in previous comparisons between the SWRT FAST modeling results and the SWRT test data. The ADAMS model results also show that the aerodynamic pitching moment impacts the blade torsion more than the inertial forces.