Abstract
The gearbox is one of the most expensive components of the wind turbine system. In order to refine the design and hence increase the long-term reliability, there has been increasing interest in utilizing time domain simulations in the prediction of gearbox design loads. In this study, three problems in time domain based gear contact fatigue analysis under dynamic conditions are discussed: (1) the torque reversal problem under low wind speed conditions, (2) statistical uncertainty effects due to time domain simulations and (3) simplified long term contact fatigue analysis of the gear tooth under dynamic conditions. Several recommendations to deal with these issues are proposed based on analyses of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory’s 750 kW land-based Gearbox Reliability Collaborative wind turbine.
Highlights
With the growth of the share of wind energy in the energy market, the design and implementation of large scale wind turbines has become a common occurrence
National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) is performing a long-term project to improve the accuracy of dynamic gearbox testing to assess gearbox and drivetrain options, problems, and solutions under simulated field conditions
As the torque reversal problem is severe for the 4P and the 6P controllers at low wind speeds, a continuous segment taken from the entire time series of the contact forces for each wind speed is identified in terms of the maximum value of the mean contact forces, and is used to get the mean value and the standard deviation of the contact forces for each simulation sample from here on, which is a simplified method used in this study
Summary
With the growth of the share of wind energy in the energy market, the design and implementation of large scale wind turbines has become a common occurrence. Dong et al [10] performed long-term fatigue analysis of multi-planar tubular joints for jacket-type offshore wind turbines using time domain simulations. There is, at present, limited literature concerning long-term time-domain based analysis of mechanical components, e.g., main shaft, gears and bearings, in the wind turbine drive train system under dynamic conditions. This is mainly due to the complexities involved in modeling and simulating the drivetrain with respect to the computation efforts and scale. Dong et al [14] established and applied a long-term time domain based gear contact fatigue analysis of a wind turbine under dynamic conditions.
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