CFD Analysis of NREL Phase VI wind turbine

Examine NREL phase VI wind turbine geometry, featuring a 21% thick S809 airfoil from 25% to 100% span, and a three-section blade with twist and chord from the design table.

Explore how drag-type and lift-type wind turbines rotate, and define pitch and twist angles, angle of attack, and lift and drag components under wind flow.

Import S809 coordinates into SolidWorks 2020 by creating a three-column X Y Z file, importing as a 3D point cloud, and setting units to meters with six decimal places.

Create plane 0 and a 3-d sketch from S809 coordinates in meters to form the aerofoil’s leading edge, upper surface, and bottom surface, enabling twists on 0–21 planes for cfd.

Create a center point at 30 percent of the aerofoil chord to define the rotation axis, fix the origin, and scale the aerofoil to a 1 m chord.

Create a square trailing edge for the aerofoil by trimming a vertical line, modeling a blunt trailing edge that aligns with manufacturing realities of the NREL phase VI wind turbine.

Create 21 planes at precise radial locations to define 21 aerofoil sections for blade lofting in the CFD analysis of the NREL Phase VI wind turbine.

Create 21 airfoils on 21 planes by sketching on plane 1, selecting the aerofoil chain, and applying twist angles, chord lengths, and a 3-degree global pitch.

Use the loft command to create a blade section from 21 aerofoil profiles in SolidWorks, selecting sketches 01–21 in sequence and adjusting anchor points for a seamless blade geometry.

Model the NREL phase VI wind turbine blade in SolidWorks by creating three sections, including 21 aerofoil profiles from S809, a transition base, and lofted bases for hub and domains.

Import the Solidworks turbine model into Spaceclaim, repair edges and duplicates, create inner and outer domains, mesh in ICEM CFD, join with Fluent interface, and set the global pitch angle.

Apply a 3-degree global pitch angle to the NREL Phase VI wind turbine blade in SpaceClaim, aligning with the wind direction by adjusting the blade’s origin and twist angles.

Create a full wind turbine assembly by modeling a hub and blades, patterning a second blade, and revolving the hub to form a single solid using no merge, then combine.

Rotate the blade geometry 90 degrees to align with the +Z flow axis, and set the origin at the hub’s back center. Verify the radius is 5.029 for Z-axis alignment.

Create the inner flow domain around the wind turbine by defining a plane and circle, shaping it with section mode, and subtracting the blade to keep only the domain surface.

Create the outer domain to represent atmospheric conditions for CFD wind turbine simulations. Subtract the inner domain to form three interfaces with the outer, then mesh and prepare Fluent input.

Define named selections for outer and inner domains in SpaceClaim, including inlet, outlet, outer wall, and interfaces, then save and prepare for import into ICM CFD.

Learn to adjust display properties and colors of geometry in SpaceClaim, including hiding edges, toggling solid and surface visibility, and applying opacity, color, and rendering finishes.

Construct a symmetric, periodic half-model of a wind turbine by halving inner and outer domains, applying periodic boundary conditions, and defining PER1_inner and PER2_inner for efficient CFD.

Explore the ICEM CFD meshing workflow for the Phase VI wind turbine, covering geometry, inner and outer domain meshes, prism layer based boundary refinement, and turbulence model comparisons.

Import the inner domain geometry into ICEM CFD, organize folders for Spaceclaim, Solidworks, ICEM CFD, and Fluent, and apply boundary conditions while viewing surfaces in solid view.

Explore ICEM CFD display properties for the NREL Phase VI wind turbine: switch solid, wireframe, simple, and detailed views, and use red, yellow, blue color cues to diagnose geometry issues.

Learn to create part names in ICEM CFD when named selections are unavailable, assigning surface-based boundary conditions, plus separate parts for curves and points for wind turbine geometry.

Create a material point in ICEM CFD to define a solid volume from watertight surfaces; place points by center, location, or topology, and hide them to avoid solver export.

Explore ICEM CFD types, including .prj, .uns, tin (tetra input), and msh files for fluent input, and learn how surface triangulation affects mesh accuracy when inputting a mesh into ICEM.

Set topo tolerance and triangulation tolerance in ICEM CFD to build topology over water-tight surfaces, avoid mesh holes, and relate surface resolution to the average mesh size.

Analyze triangulation tolerance in ICEM CFD to improve geometry quality, using edge display, surface quality, curvature effects, and a default 0.001, with guidance on mesh refinement and final mesh computation.

Define mesh sizes for the wind turbine blade using the mesh menu and surface mesh setup, refining leading and trailing edges with tetra sizes based on edge length and curvature.

Define mesh sizes for the wind turbine blade, starting with 0.04 on the leading and trailing edges and hub, and set interfaces to yield about 100 nodes around the circumference.

Set the global mesh size to 0.4 to cap element growth on turbine blade surfaces and interfaces, ensuring the volume mesh cannot exceed this maximum size.

Adjust meshing parameters to fix mesh generation issues in NREL phase VI wind turbine CFD workflow, switching to robust surface meshing and quick denali, and tuning tolerance and edge sizes.

Smooth the surface mesh to maximize quality for better volume meshing, using Laplace smoothing and alternating with non-Laplace passes after deleting extra edit faces.

learn how to optimize surface mesh quality through iterative smoothing with and without Laplace smoothing, stopping when quality stabilizes, then prepare for Denali volume meshing.

Create a smooth volume mesh of the wind turbine blade with the Delaunay method after comparing it with Octree, and refine the wake with density blocks.

Explore density box mesh refinement in ICEM CFD to resolve wake and boundary layer regions for accurate pressure drag, and learn how size, ratio, and width settings shape volume mesh.

Refine the surface mesh on interface 3 by creating two density boxes with varying sizes, applying the Denali method for volume matching and surface matching to improve mesh quality.

Delete the existing volume mesh and generate a density box–driven volume mesh in the wake region using quick Delaunay, then apply alternating Laplace smoothing for best mesh quality.

Master prism layers, or inflation, to capture boundary layer effects and improve drag predictions. Compare 2D and 3D meshes, including quads, triangles, tetrahedrons, prisms, and pyramids.

Create seven prism layers on the wind turbine blade, split them into three to yield twenty-one layers, then compute the mesh and assess quality using the defined criteria.

Adjust prism meshing for NREL phase VI wind turbine by dividing prism layers to 21, setting ratios to control first cell height and Y+, and improving mesh quality for Fluent.

Set interface boundary conditions for interfaces 1–3 by copying Interface_1, visualize bcs by turning the mesh white, and export the mesh as uns for ICM CFD (or .msh/.cfx5 for Fluent/CFX).

Check mesh quality in fluent for the nrel phase vi wind turbine, ensuring min quality above 0.1 and orthogonal quality around 0.06, and manage file reading and memory during setup.

Introduce tetra meshing for the outer domain and explain avoiding boundary layers on the outer wall to preserve accurate skin friction drag, while density boxes capture wake in the atmosphere.

Import geometry, set up inner and outer domains, create interfaces, and apply a density box of 1 for octree surface meshing to generate the volume mesh.

Delete the outer-domain volume elements and smooth the surface mesh to form a high-quality Delaunay volume mesh. Apply Laplace smoothing with 10 iterations and save the project.

Create density box 2 to refine the wake-region mesh using volume meshing with the dolly method, copying eight points downstream and applying a 1.2 growth ratio.

Set the maximum element size in the domain via global mesh setup, basing it on inlet and outlet scales to stay within outer boundaries.

Refine the wake-region mesh using two density boxes and the Delaunay method, building an octree-based volume mesh with smoothing, then inspect with cut-planes and save the project.

Export outer domain mesh for fluent, set interfaces and boundary conditions (velocity inlet at 7 and 10 m/s; symmetry outer wall; pressure outlet), then import meshes into fluent to run.

Enhance inner domain mesh quality with edit mesh and quality tools, applying smoothing to 0.43-1, maintaining orthogonal quality above 0.48, ensuring aspect ratio up to 8.244 and min angle 21°.

Import ICEMCFD meshes into Fluent and define inner and outer domains. Set rpm 72, inlet velocities 7 and 10 m/s, apply symmetry, and compute torque and power with frame motion.

Import inner and outer domain grids into fluent, loading meshes with read and append. Run in parallel across cores and save wind turbine cases at 7m/sec and 10m/sec.

Display and customize the wind turbine CFD mesh by loading the case, showing the mesh, and adjusting interfaces, colors, and transparency with overlays for clear visualization.

Analyze mesh quality matrices and domain info for the NREL Phase VI turbine. Note the mesh has about 30 million cells and 4.4 million nodes across inner and outer domains.

Partition the wind turbine mesh into four parts in Fluent, read the windturbine.case on a single core, then reopen with four cores to avoid convergence issues.

Configure turbulence model, cell zone settings, and boundary conditions for NREL phase VI wind turbine CFD using frame motion and rpm-based inputs.

Create and manage mesh interfaces between inner and outer domains, enabling upstream and downstream data transfer across interface boundaries using auto-create for Interface01, Interface02, and Interface03.

Set solver options for pressure and momentum, using first-order upwind, then switch to second-order upwind. Initialize the solution, run the case, and monitor wind-turbine momentum with autosave for data.

Explore contour and velocity vector plots for the NREL Phase VI wind turbine, adjusting the mesh, color bands, planes, and saved views to visualize flow and downstream behavior.

Compare CFD results with experimental data for a NREL Phase VI wind turbine by analyzing forces, moments, wind speed, rpm, and power calculations, including Cp and theoretical wind power.

Gradually ramp inlet velocity from 7 to 10 m/s to obtain torque and power at 10 m/s, avoiding divergence, verify convergence, and compare CFD torque trends with experimental data.