1
Return

Impacts of Blade Camber on Cross-Flow Turbine Performance and Loading

delete2026-04-13
delete0
delete
OA
AI
A
Ari Athair *
C
Caelan Consing
J
Jennifer A. Franck
O
Owen Williams
DOI:10.1002/we.70105delete
deleteOriginal
deleteOriginal request for help
deleteShare
deleteSave
Abstract

Abstract

En 中文
Cross-flow turbines show promise for renewable energy generation from wind and tidal sources. The rotating reference frame of cross-flow turbine blades results in virtual camber and incidence due to streamline curvature, altering the lift, drag, and pitching moment of the blades. Adding geometric camber is therefore likely to alter performance and loading; however, there is little consensus regarding the direction of camber that might be most favorable. This study compares 2% concave-in and concave-out cambered blades (NACA 2418) with symmetrical NACA 0018 foils for a turbine with a 0.49 chord-to-radius ratio. Experimental performance measurements are compared across a range of tip-speeds, and particle image velocimetry is used to explore the in-rotor flow evolution through the cycle. Concave-out blades, which enhance virtual camber and lift in the power stroke, are found to exhibit sub-optimal performance. In contrast, concave-in cambered blades slightly improved symmetrical blade performance by enhancing downstream flow reattachment, more than compensating for reduced peak power generation. The difference between each cambered foil is seen to grow with increasing tip-speed ratio. Moreover, these concave-in blades reduce peak loading by 13%, which may prove critical in future designs, especially at high tip-speed ratios. Exploration of the near-blade flow fields suggests that the influence of geometric camber is nonlinear and that use of a simplistic summation of both geometric and virtual camber to account for camber effects may be overly simplistic. Despite this, corresponding validated simulations suggest that a small but positive net camber (geometric plus virtual) is optimal for this turbine.
Keywords:
cambered blades
cross-flow turbine
marine energy
vertical axis wind turbine
virtual camber

Journal

Wind Energy cover
Wind Energy
IF:
3.3
Papers:
2.5K
Citations:
6.5K

Organization

U
university of wisconsin madison
Scholars:
3.7W
Papers: 2.9W
Citations: 52
U
university of washington
Scholars:
7.8K
Papers: 3.7K
Citations: 2
Cited Papers

Cited Papers

Citing Papers

Citing Papers