Characterization of a wind turbine model for wake aerodynamics studies

A model wind turbine has been designed at the University of Hamburg within the scope of the FP7 fundend project WAUDIT. The purpose of the experiment described in this paper is to characterize the performances of two rotors by means of measuring the thrust coefficient C_t. C_t is a similarity parameter for the wake and is thought to be the most effective one. Its value has been directly measured using a force balance and indirectly calculated from the velocity profiles measured three diameters downstream of the rotor with hot wire anemometry. Results show that, in order to reproduce the wake behaviour, the matching of the C_t, which is a quantitative achievement, has to be integrated with measurements such as velocity profiles in the wake. In fact the velocity deficit illustrates the mechanism of transforming the axial momentum into torque assuring qualitatively the proper reproduction of the wake. This latter information assures that the achievement of a certain thrust force acting on the rotor is due to its performances in transforming the axial momentum into torque and not an effect of other phenomena such as a stall at the blades.