Experimental Analysis on the Application of Flaps on Small Scale Vertical Axis Wind Turbines

Abstract

Vertical axis wind turbines (VAWT) have gained interest in the last few years. Multiple studies have been performed on how to improve their power generation capacity. One alternative that was evaluated in some articles consist on applying vertical flaps at the trailing edge of the airfoil. In order to compare the computational simulations performed on a 2D hybrid RANS-LES model, we constructed hybrid VAWTS with a 3D printer with a slightly higher aspect ratio. We tested their performance in a porpusedly built wind tunnel, that reached wind speed of 10 meters per second. While the simulations predict an increase in the power generation, the experiments show a reduction of similar magnitude. This leads us to believe that there is a big geometric dependency in the problem or a three dimensional effect that cannot be represented in the computational model.