Comparison of different cross-sectional approaches for the structural design and optimization of composite wind turbine blades based on beam models

Abstract. During the preliminary design phase of wind turbine blades, the evaluation of many design candidates in a short period of time plays an important role. Computationally efficient methods for the structural analysis that correctly predict stiffness matrix entries for beam models including the (bend–twist) coupling terms are thus needed. The present paper provides an extended overview of available approaches and shows their abilities to fulfill the requirements for the composite design of rotor blades with respect to accuracy and computational efficiency. Three cross-sectional theories are selected and implemented to compare the prediction quality of the cross-sectional coupling stiffness terms and the stress distribution based on different multi-cell test cross-sections. The cross-sectional results are compared with the 2D finite element code BECAS and are discussed in the context of accuracy and computational efficiency. The analytical solution performing best shows very small deviations in the stiffness matrix entries compared to BECAS (below 1 % in the majority of test cases). It achieved a better resolution of the stress distribution and a computation time that is more than an order of magnitude smaller using the same spatial discretization. The deviations of the stress distributions are below 10 % for most test cases. The analytical solution can thus be rated as a feasible approach for a beam-based pre-design of wind turbine rotor blades.