Structural design optimization of vertical axis wind turbine type darrieus-savonius

The design of wind turbine is always interesting to be studied. Studies on the optimal structure design of wind turbine have been studied by many researchers but are still continuing up to now. The present study is intended to investigate the optimal structure design of Darrieus-Savonius Vertical Axis Wind Turbine (DS VAWT) type by using numerical simulation method. A small 500 W DS VAWT was investigated in this research. Design modifications were begun with several tasks to find the critical parts of wind turbine, after that the modifications were analyzed and improved according to the source of weakness. Several modifications were simulated: shorten the inner shaft and change the inner shaft material. The simulations results show that the critical part from DS VAWT system is the inner shaft, by shortening the inner shaft, the structure strength will improved significantly. Changing the inner shaft material did not show a great improvement.