Lift Enhancement for Wind Turbines

Wind turbine blade design that improves power generation and lift by reducing vorticity downstream. The blade has an increasing chord towards the tip, changing twist angle, and/or thickness along the length. This creates counter-rotating vortices behind the blade for higher efficiency. The chord has a local minimum, max closer to the tip, and inflection points. The twist has min, max closer to tip. The blade shape reduces vorticity and increases lift compared to conventional designs.

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Horizontal axis wind turbine blade design that improves efficiency at high speeds. The blade has an airfoil section with a double-sided lift profile that allows it to maintain lift and generate power at supersonic speeds. The airfoil has a unique shape where the upper and lower edges intersect directly instead of forming a gap. This prevents separation and stall at high speeds. The blade also has a shock wave management system to reduce damage and noise at supersonic speeds. The shock wave angles are calculated to reduce windward side speeds without generating shocks. This enables the blade to operate efficiently at very high wind speeds.

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A new wind turbine blade design that aims to improve efficiency, reduce costs, and simplify manufacturing compared to conventional wind turbine blades. The key feature is replacing the fixed blades with aerodynamic elements (ADEs) that can rotate independently around the turbine shaft. The ADEs are made up of segments connected by spokes and have curved shapes optimized for specific air flow speeds. This allows the ADEs to align better with the wind as they rotate, reducing air resistance and increasing energy capture. The spoke extensions beyond the ADE tips provide lightning protection. The modular design enables easier transportation and assembly compared to large fixed blades.

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Vertical axis wind turbine with blunt trailing edge airfoils to improve power generation efficiency of lift-type vertical axis wind turbines. The blades have symmetrical airfoils with thickened trailing edges. The trailing edge thickness is 3% of the chord length. This blunt trailing edge shape reduces flow separation and improves lift compared to traditional pointed trailing edges, especially at high tip speeds. It does not require active flow control methods or auxiliary devices.

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Wind turbine blade with added Gurney flaps near the trailing edge that improve lift without significantly increasing drag. The flaps are mounted on the pressure or suction side of the blade in the outer third of the span. They have a height of 0.1-0.5% of the chord length and are angled 1-30 degrees to the chord. This configuration provides lift boost without drag penalty compared to traditional Gurney flap positions. Using two different sized flaps on inner and outer sections further improves blade performance.

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Wind turbine blade attachments to improve aerodynamics and power generation. The attachments are flow-guiding devices like spoilers or Gurney flaps. The devices are attached to the blade surface with flexible housings filled with adhesive. This allows bonding without grinding or complex prep steps. The attachments are also positioned in triangles to distribute loads, curved to accommodate blade bending, and reinforced with ribs for stiffness.

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Vertical axis wind turbine with improved aerodynamics and energy conversion efficiency compared to conventional vertical axis wind turbines. The turbine has airfoil blades with localized moving surfaces that extend 70% of the chord length from the leading edge. This band of moving surface reaches maximum speed of 7 times the incoming wind speed. This design suppresses flow separation and improves lift at low tip speeds. The moving surface has a tubular motor at the end to generate power. The turbine also uses an angle sensor to monitor blade rotation and optimize performance.

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Lift-type vertical axis wind turbine with partial moving surface blades that improves wind energy conversion efficiency without requiring external energy injection. The blades have moving surfaces 70% of chord length from the leading edge that reach 7 times wind speed. This partial moving surface design suppresses flow separation at low tip speeds while avoiding excessive energy consumption at high speeds compared to full surface active control. The moving surfaces are connected to tubular motors inside the blades for active control.

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Wind turbine blade design with improved aerodynamics using vortex generators with airfoil shapes. The vortex generators are installed on the suction surface of the blade to prevent flow separation and improve blade performance. The vortex generators have an airfoil shape with a curved top and horizontal tip. The airfoil shape reduces drag compared to a flat vortex generator. The curved top creates turbulence to delay flow separation, while the horizontal tip reduces separation at the blade tip. This improves lift and reduces drag compared to flat vortex generators.

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A wind turbine blade design with a rotating winglet at the tip to improve efficiency by reducing turbulence and increasing lift. The blade tip winglet can rotate relative to the blade body, allowing it to move into an optimal position for capturing wind energy. This reduces interference from blade tip turbulence and improves lift. The winglet rotation is driven by internal mechanisms housed in cavities at the winglet and blade tips.

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Wind turbine blade design with rotating tip winglets to improve blade efficiency and power output. The blade has a rotatable winglet attached to the tip. The winglet can rotate independently from the main blade body. This allows the winglet to move into a position that reduces turbulence at the blade tip. By reducing turbulence, the lift of the blade can be increased, enabling more efficient energy extraction from the wind. The winglet rotation is driven by mechanisms inside the blade tip and main body cavity.

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Wind turbine blade design with improved wind capture and reduced gaps between blades. The blade shape has a tip and rear end that spirals continuously around the axis within a specific phase angle. This allows full wind capture as the blade rotates without gaps. The blade can also be tilted at any angle to optimize wind capture vs detecting wind direction. The blades are molded as an integral structure with the hub to reduce weight and provide strength.

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A lifting device for wind turbine blades during installation that automatically stabilizes the blade orientation in windy conditions. The device uses sensors on the lifting yoke to measure blade position and rotation. A controller analyzes the sensor data and commands a pitching device on the yoke to rotate the blade if it starts moving too much due to wind forces.

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Vertical axis wind turbine with a diagonal support member to improve airflow and power generation. The turbine has blades extending parallel to the vertical rotation axis. The blades are connected to the hub by a diagonal support member that extends from the hub to near the blade tip. This shape increases airflow to the blade tips by avoiding interference with the blade airflow. It also improves support rigidity against bending moments. The diagonal support member connects the hub and blade near the tip instead of extending straight. This reduces obstruction of airflow to the blade tips. It also improves hub-blade bending rigidity since the support member is closer to the load point at the blade tip.

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Wind turbine blade design to improve aerodynamics and energy production. The design includes attaching flow-modifying devices like spoilers or Gurney flaps to the surface of the blade. The devices are attached with flexible housings filled with adhesive to bond them to the blade surface. This allows the devices to modify airflow and increase lift without compromising blade structural integrity.

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A wind turbine design that can capture both horizontal wind and valley winds to improve efficiency compared to conventional horizontal axis wind turbines. The turbine has horizontal blades connected around the hub, and vertical blades extending down from the hub. The vertical blades capture valley winds while the horizontal blades capture horizontal winds. The blades are pitched independently to optimize performance for each wind direction. This allows capturing more wind energy from both horizontal and vertical flows, increasing the overall conversion rate of wind energy.

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A wind turbine blade design with a flap at the root to increase lift force. The flap is located near the blade root where wind speeds are lower due to the smaller rotation radius. This allows the blade to generate more lift at low wind speeds, improving overall efficiency. However, the flap also adds drag, so it is not used at high wind speeds due to safety concerns.

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Wind turbine blade design with a sliding flap at the leading edge to increase lift and power generation at low wind speeds. The blade has a section with a cutout at the leading edge that forms a flap. The flap is slidably connected to the blade airfoil section. A hydraulic cylinder moves the flap to adjust the blade shape at low wind speeds. This increases the curvature and windward area of the airfoil sections to capture more energy. The flap retracts at higher wind speeds to restore the blade shape.

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Optimizing the performance of large wind turbine rotor blades by using split blades with vortex generators that prevent flow separation while minimizing drag. The blades have a separation point along the length and inner and outer sections. The vortex generator extends from the separation point towards the tip. The key is keeping the ratio of the vortex generator's outer length to the total blade length below 0.25 to avoid excessive drag. This allows preventing flow separation near the hub without adding excessive drag.

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Airfoil shape for wind turbine blades that improves lift, stall angle, and drag compared to conventional wind turbine airfoils. The airfoil has a unique cross-section with sections named S1-S5. The upper surface transitions smoothly from trailing edge to leading edge (S2) and then has excessive curvature (S3). The lower surface has a concave shape (S5) with larger camber than conventional airfoils (S809). This design ensures small angle of attack lift, inhibits separation at high angles, and improves lift and drag compared to conventional airfoils.

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