Effects of leading edge slat on flow separation and aerodynamic performance of wind turbine

Abstract

The flow separation could affect the aerodynamic performance of the wind turbine blades and induce to occur the stall of the wind turbine blades at high angle of attack. The leading edge slat could effectively control and delay the flow separation. In this paper, the effects of the leading edge slat on the aerodynamic performance of the S809 airfoil and the Phase VI blade were investigated and the effects of the geometric parameters were considered. The aerodynamic performance of the S809 airfoil and the Phase VI blade was obtained using the RANS approach, and involved the standard transition model SST, k-omega turbulence model. It was shown that the leading edge slat had a great influence on the aerodynamic performance of the S809 airfoil and the Phase VI blade. For Case-1, when the angle of attack was 16.22°, the point of flow separation was shifted from x/c = 0.47 to 0.67, the lift coefficient increased by 52.99%. The torques of the total (included the wind turbine blade and leading edge slat) were increased except the torque of Blade-C1at 10 m/s.