The application of nondestructive techniques to the testing of a wind turbine blade

Conference · Thu Jul 01 04:00:00 EDT 1993

OSTI ID:10175219

Sutherland, H J ^[1]; Musial, W ^[2]

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1. Sandia National Labs., Albuquerque, NM (US)
2. National Renewable Energy Lab., Golden, CO (US)

NonDestructive Testing (NDT) is commonly used to monitor structures before, during and after testing. This paper reports on the use of two NDT techniques to monitor the behavior of a typical wind turbine blade during a quasi-static test-to-failure. The test used a three-point spanwise load distribution to load a 7.9-m blade to failure. The two NDT techniques used were acoustic emission and coherent optical. The former monitors the acoustic energy produced by the blade as it is loaded. The latter uses electronic shearography to measure the differences in surface displacements between two load states with an accuracy of a few microns. Typical results are presented to demonstrate the ability of these two techniques to locate and monitor both high damage regions and flaws in the blade structure. Further, this experiment highlights the limitations in the techniques that must be addressed before one or both can be transferred, with a high probability of success, to the inspection and monitoring of turbine blades during the manufacturing process and under normal operating conditions.

• Research Organization: Sandia National Labs., Albuquerque, NM (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE, Washington, DC (United States)
• DOE Contract Number: AC04-76DP00789
• OSTI ID: 10175219
• Report Number(s): SAND--93-0251C; CONF-930726--1; ON: DE93016731
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

17 WIND ENERGY
170602
42 ENGINEERING
420500
ACOUSTIC EMISSION TESTING
BENCH-SCALE EXPERIMENTS
DYNAMIC LOADS
FRACTURES
MATERIALS TESTING
MONITORING
NONDESTRUCTIVE TESTING
OPTICAL PROPERTIES
QUALITY CONTROL
SHEAR PROPERTIES
TURBINE BLADES
TURBINE DESIGN AND OPERATION
WIND TURBINES