Pressure distribution of rotating small wind turbine blades with winglet using wind tunnel

Abstract

This study presents pressure distribution over an envelope of blade with and without winglets for a small wind turbine in boundary layer wind tunnel. Different winglet configurations were tried based on winglet height and curvature radius. Pressure measurements were made with different chordwise and spanwise locations on the blade with and without winglets nearby tip region. Winglet improves overall pressure difference between pressure surface and suction surface. Presence of winglet seemed to have the pressure increased at 0.3c and maximum pressure difference was observed at a span of 0.95R for all winglet configurations. In suction, surface pressure decrease was 10% for all winglet configurations.