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US 2014/0278151 A1Published application
Nondestructive acoustic doppler testing of wind turbine blades from the ground during operation
AssigneeDigital Wind Systems, Inc.
InventorJohn W. Newman
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A wind turbine blade inspection system includes a sensitive microphone positioned near the base of the turbine tower to receive acoustic signals emanating from anomalies in a rotating turbine blades and a signal analysis system configured to analyze the acoustic signals including Doppler analysis. The data may be centrally monitored and recorded for wind power asset management.
Claims14
An apparatus for inspecting rotating wind turbine blades, comprising:
- a microphone positioned approximately in a plane of a turbine disk at a point under a lowest level of a blade tip as its rotates, so as to to receive acoustic signals emanating from air escaping through breaches in a blade outer mold line from an interior or subsurface defect in the blade;
- and
- analyzing means for analyzing the acoustic signals thus received in order to detect the presence of a potential defect.
An apparatus for inspecting rotating wind turbine blades, comprising:
- a microphone positioned near a rotating wind turbine;
- a signal recording device;
- and
- analyzing means for analyzing the sound signals so received by determining the maximum and minimum frequencies of sound emitted from anomalies in a wind turbine blade and calculating the position of anomalies in or on rotating turbine blades using the Doppler shift.
1 more element
A method of detecting an anomaly in a rotating wind turbine blade, comprising steps of:
- monitoring acoustic emissions from a wind turbine blade;
- and
- performing a Doppler analysis on the acoustic emissions in order to identify an anomaly in the wind turbine blade.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.