A comparative study on the dynamic behaviour of 10 MW conventional and compact gearboxes for offshore wind turbines

Abstract

This study compares the dynamic behaviour of a conventional and a compact gearbox for the DTU 10 MW wind turbine supported on a monopile offshore structure. The conventional gearbox configuration is composed of two planetary epicyclic stages and one parallel stage, while the compact gearbox configuration consists of a fixed planetary stage and a differential compound epicyclic stage. The design methodology for these two gearboxes is described, and the final gearbox specifications show a lighter weight and smaller volume for the compact gearbox design compared to the conventional one. Computational gearbox models are established using the multi‐body system dynamic analysis method. A decoupled approach is employed for the gearbox load effect analysis. Comparisons of the dynamic behaviour between these two gearboxes are conducted under pure torque load cases, tangential pin position error conditions and non‐torque load cases. The results demonstrate that the compact gearbox has better dynamic performance under different torque load cases and is more robust to withstand the effects of manufacturing errors and rotor non‐torque loads compared to the conventional gearbox. It is believed that the proposed compact gearbox concept is promising and would be a good alternative for multi‐megawatt floating wind turbines, although challenging with respect to the design and operation complexity.

Serviceability Limit State Assessment of Semi-Submersible Floating Wind Turbines

“…On the basis of this work, future research should be conducted to further clarify the specific serviceability criteria and to establish connections between serviceability and safety criteria, also relating, for instance, to clearance requirements. One interesting work will be investigating the influence of floater design on nacelle surge acceleration and then on drivetrain safety of the 10-MW turbine based on the present work and authors' previous studies [17][18][19][20] in relation to drivetrain analysis.…”

Effect of Turbulent Wind Conditions on the Dynamic Characteristics of a Herringbone Planetary Gear System of a Wind Turbine

“…Chen et al [20] presented a multi-source external environmental load modelling method and investigated resonance identification and dynamic responses under electromechanical coupling conditions. Wang et al [21] studied the dynamic characteristics of both conventional and compact wind turbine gearboxes, including load-sharing and fatigue damage assessment. Tan et al [22,23] performed a series of developments on an external environmental load acting on a gear transmission system of a wind turbine, revealing the effect of complex load conditions on the system, such as the voltage dip and platform motion and time-varying wind load.…”

Study on Novel Yaw Error Strategy for Wind Turbines Based on a Multi-Body Dynamics Method

“…It was found that the over-simplified model cannot accurately generate the coupling relationship and dynamic load among the independent components (Hu et al, 2017;He et al, 2021). In further research developments, detailed modeling of wind turbine dynamics models has gradually become the focus (Wang et al, 2020;Xu et al, 2020).…”