Current Research | Offshore Engineering

Fluid-Structure Interaction (FSI) Analysis of the Composite Material Blades

By Zhongsheng Deng, Dr Qing Xiao

The mechanical properties of composite materials blades in terms of, for example, stiffness and tensile, behaves vastly different compared to the conventional metal-based blades. In order to investigate the impacts when the wind flows functioning on the blades, a fully-coupled CFD and composite material FSI numerical model will be analysed with the use of both commercial CFD software and our in-house code.

The main objective is to understand the mechanics of wind turbine blades change under various unsteady wind environments for the offshore bottom fixed and floating wind turbine.

By conducting this research, the information provided from numerical modelling will contribute to the structural fatigue analysis and blade design optimization