A Hybrid Testing Framework for Wind Turbine Mechanical Components

Abstract As wind turbines continue to increase in size, hybrid testing is emerging as a key-enabling solution for experimental assessment of their large mechanical components. Hybrid testing is conducted using a hybrid model which combines physically tested and numerically simulated components. In this work, the Kane method is proposed to formulate the equation of motion for the hybrid model of a wind turbine rotor system where one single blade is physically tested. The Kane method allows for formulating the equation of motion of multi-body-dynamic models efficiently and, therefore, it is widely used in state-of-art simulation software. The hybrid model of the rotor is successfully implemented on a single-degree-of-freedom test bench with a cantilever steel beam serving as the physical substructure. The performance of the implemented hybrid model is assessed through a comparison with a pure numerical simulation of the same system. The main finding of the study emphasizes the efficiency of incorporating physically measured restoring force as model parameters while formulating the equation of motion of a hybrid model.