This article reports about a wind-tunnel experiment carried out in the ONERA F2 low-speed wind tunnel on a model of the DU 97-W-300Mod airfoil designed for wind turbine application. The wind tunnel, the airfoil model, and experimental techniques used are presented, with special emphasis on the data processing and corrections required to derive airfoil forces and pressure distribution. To better document the flow physics at play, the results are illustrated by infrared thermography and surface oil flow visualization. The test allowed investigating Reynolds number effects between 1 and 3.8 millions. To ameliorate the understanding of the benefits and limitations of such airfoil testing, one section is devoted to the comparison of present results with previous experiments in other wind tunnels. Some of the difficulties arising in airfoil testing are evidenced and discussed to contribute to the improvement of test methods.

This chapter focuses on airfoils for wind turbine blades and their characteristics. The use of panel codes such as XFOIL and RFOIL and CFD codes for the prediction of airfoil characteristics is briefly described. This chapter then discusses the requirements for wind turbine blade airfoils and the effect of leading edge roughness and Reynolds number. After a description of how airfoils can be tested, this chapter discusses methods to represent airfoil characteristics at high angles of attack. A number of methods for correcting characteristics for the effect of three-dimensional flow on the blade are presented. This chapter then discusses ways to establish a data set for blade design and concludes with a view on future research in the field of wind turbine blade airfoils.

An accurate representation of two-dimensional airfoil characteristics measured in a wind tunnel generally requires the inclusion of corrections for interference effects that exist due to the presence of the wind tunnel walls. This chapter discusses the most commonly used correction schemes both for streamlined and separated flow regimes. The classical correction method based on small velocity perturbations gives very good results up to angles of attack of about 20 degrees for chord-to-tunnel height ratios c/h up to 0.36. Even with separation of the boundary layer at a chord location of 30% the corrected pressure distribution matches that of a much smaller model with c/h = 0.15. In the deep-stall range of angles of attack, where the flow separates from the leading edge, the method based on the wake analysis by Maskell with a blockage factor of 0.96 seems to give good results for two-dimensional models up to c/h values of 0.27. A comparison with measurements corrected with the matrix version of the pressure signature method, which uses the pressure distribution on the tunnel walls, shows that the latter leads to slightly larger corrections. Maskell’s method, for which the blockage parameter of 0.96 apparently is based on a single measurement of a two-dimensional flat plate, seems to give better results when a value of 1.03 is used.

At the 1998 Nagano Winter Olympic Games, zigzag tape was introduced on the race suit lower legs and cap of speed skaters. Application of these zigzag devices on live skaters and cylinders in the wind tunnel showed large improvements in the aerodynamic drag. These wind-tunnel results were unfortunately not widely published, and the impact of the zigzag strips in a real skating environment was never established. This paper aims to show the background of the application of the zigzag tape and to establish the impact it may have had on speed-skating performance. From comparisons of 5000 m races just before, during and just after the Nagano Olympics and an analysis of historic world record data of the 1500 m men’s speed skating, the impact of the zigzag tape turbulators on average lap times on 1500 and 5000 m races is calculated to be about 0.5 s.

A relatively simple method is presented to predict the maximum two-dimensional drag coefficient of an airfoil only using its shape. The method is based on a contribution related to the leading edge thickness in terms of the y/c coordinate at x/c=0.0125 and a contribution related to the trailing edge flow angle which appears also to be sensitive to the leading edge thickness. The relations were deduced from measurements in the Delft low-turbulence wind tunnel. The first contribution was established using 3 airfoil models with systematically varying leading edge y/c coordinates and a zero trailing edge angle. The second followed from measurements of one of these airfoils equipped with sheet metal flaps of various flap deflections. Compared to measurements found in the public domain differences are found up to ? 2.3% with an average of about-0.2%.

Standard passive aerodynamic flow control devices such as vortex generators and gurney flaps have a working principle that is well understood. They increase the stall angle and the lift below stall and are mainly applied at the inboard part of wind turbine blades. However, the potential of applying a rigidly fixed leading-edge slat element at inboard blade stations is less well understood but has received some attention in the past decade. This solution may offer advantages not only under steady conditions but also under unsteady inflow conditions such as yaw. This article aims at further clarifying what an optimal two-element configuration with a thick main element would look like and what kind of performance characteristics can be expected from a purely aerodynamic point of view. To accomplish this an aerodynamic shape optimization procedure is used to derive optimal profile designs for different optimization boundary conditions including the optimization of both the slat and the main element. The performance of the optimized designs shows several positive characteristics compared to single-element airfoils, such as a high stall angle, high lift below stall, low roughness sensitivity, and higher aerodynamic efficiency. Furthermore, the results highlight the benefits of an integral design procedure, where both slat and main element are optimized, over an auxiliary one. Nevertheless, the designs also have two caveats, namely a steep drop in lift post-stall and high positive pitching moments.

Aerodynamic experiments have been executed in the wind tunnel and on a wind turbine blade to measure the impact of roughness on the airfoil characteristics and the associated effect on rotor performance and to establish the transition location on a rotating blade. The wind tunnel tests have been performed in the low-speed, low-turbulence wind tunnel of TUDelft. The wind turbine tests were carried out at ECN's Wind Turbine Test Site. Roughness simulation material has been installed on the airfoil leading edge to measure the impact on airfoil performance. Microphones were mounted on the airfoil surface to detect the boundary layer laminar to turbulent transition position both on the wind tunnel model and on the wind turbine blade.

The accuracy of airfoil polar predictions is limited by the usage of imperfect turbulence models. Can machine-learning improve this situation? Will airfoil polars teach the effect of turbulence on skin-friction? We try to answer these questions by refining turbulence treatment in the Rfoil code: boundary layer closure relations are learned from airfoil polar data. Two turbulent closure relations, for skin friction and energy shape factor, are parametrized with a class-shape transformation. An experimental database is then used to define code inaccuracy measures that are minimized with an interior point gradient algorithm. Results show that airfoil polars contain exploitable information about turbulent phenomena. Inferred closures agree with direct numerical simulation results of skin friction and the new code predicts drag more accurately. Maximum lift remains under-predicted but Rfoil maintains its robustness and suitability for optimization of wind energy airfoils.

In modern large wind turbine blades thick flat back airfoils are often used in the root part of the blades due to their structural advantages. Although in the root structural properties are more important than aerodynamic performance, thick flat back airfoils do have higher drag which limits their applicability. Numerical simulations demonstrated that a previously introduced non-conventional flat back airfoil concept, called “swallow tail”, has potential showing lower drag for similar or slightly improved lift values. In the present study the swallow tail concept is evaluated experimentally in the TU Delft low-speed wind tunnel. An existing wind tunnel model of airfoil DU97-W-300 was modified to obtain a flat back airfoil with a 10% trailing edge thickness. The model was tested in the wind tunnel with and without the swallow tail for various conditions. The results of the experiment showed that the swallow tail reduced the drag up to 40% at various angles of attack. Moreover, the maximum glide ratio increased up to 45% while both the stall and post stall behavior remained almost identical. The results suggest that the swallow tail can help to increase power output of the wind turbine without modifying the turbine’s operating conditions. Due to the lower drag thick flat back airfoil sections could possibly be located at more inboard parts of the blades.

Passive vane-type vortex generators (VGs) are commonly used on wind turbine blades to mitigate the effects of flow separation. However, significant uncertainty surrounds VG design guidelines. Understanding the influence of VG parameters on airfoil performance requires a systematic approach targeting wind energy-specific airfoils. Thus, the 30%-thick DU97-W-300 airfoil was equipped with numerous VG designs, and its performance was evaluated in the Delft University Low Turbulence Wind Tunnel at a chord-based Reynolds number of 2×10⁶. Oil-flow visualizations confirmed the suppression of separation as a result of the vortex-induced mixing. Further investigation of the oil streaks demonstrated a method to determine the vortex strength. The airfoil performance sensitivity to 41 different VG designs was explored by analysing model and wake pressures. The chordwise positioning, array configuration, and vane height were of prime importance. The sensitivity to vane length, inclination angle, vane shape, and array packing density proved secondary. The VGs were also able to delay stall with simulated airfoil surface roughness. The use of the VG mounting strip was detrimental to the airfoil's performance, highlighting the aerodynamic cost of the commonly used mounting technique. Time-averaged pressure distributions and the lift standard deviation revealed that the presence of VGs increases load fluctuations in the stalling regime, compared with the uncontrolled case.

This study describes a methodology for designing airfoils suitable to employ actuation in a wind energy environment. The novel airfoil sections are baptized wind energy actuated profiles (WAP). A genetic algorithm-based multi-objective airfoil optimizer is formulated by setting two cost functions: one cost function for wind energy performance and the other representing actuation suitability. The wind energy cost function compares the candidate airfoils' performance with 'reference' wind energy airfoils, considering a probabilistic approach to include the effects of turbulence and wind shear. The actuation suitability cost function is developed considering horizontal axis wind turbines active stall control, including two different control strategies designated by 'enhanced' and 'decreased' performance. Two different actuation types are considered, namely, boundary layer transpiration and dielectric barrier discharge plasma. Results show that using WAP airfoils provides much higher control efficiency than adding actuation on reference wind energy airfoils, without detrimental effects in non-actuated operation. The WAP sections yield an actuator employment efficiency that is two to four times larger than those obtained with reference wind energy airfoils, at equivalent wind energy performance. Regarding geometry, and compared with typical wind energy airfoils, WAP sections for decreased performance display an upper surface concave aft region, while for increased performance, a convex upper surface aft region is obtained. The present study emphasizes that there is much to gain in designing airfoils from the beginning to include actuation effects, especially compared with employing actuation on already existing airfoils. The results demonstrate the potential of including actuation effects in the airfoil design process, thus enabling novel horizontal axis wind turbines control strategies.