Hydro turbine prototype testing and generation of performance curves: Fully automated approach

• Published in: Renewable energy 2014-11, Vol.71, p.433-441
• Main Authors: Aggidis, George A., Židonis, Audrius
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Applied sciences; Automation; Energy; Energy of waters: ocean thermal energy, wave and tidal energy, etc; Energy. Thermal use of fuels; Exact sciences and technology; Hill charts; Hydroelectric power plants; Hydropower; Installations for energy generation and conversion: thermal and electrical energy; Natural energy; Renewable energy; Turbine testing; Turbines
• ISSN: 0960-1481; 1879-0682
• DOI: 10.1016/j.renene.2014.05.043

This paper presents a technology that can accelerate the development of hydro turbines by fully automating the initial testing process of prototype turbine models and automatically converting the acquired data into efficiency hill charts that allow straight forward comparison of prototypes' performance. The testing procedure of both reaction and impulse turbines is illustrated using models of Francis and Pelton turbines respectively. For the development of an appropriate hill chart containing no less than 780 points the average duration of the fully automated test is 4 h while the acquired data files can be processed into descriptive standard efficiency hill charts within less than a minute. These hill charts can then be used in research and development to quickly evaluate and compare the performance of initial turbine prototype designs before proceeding to much lengthier and more expensive development stage of the chosen design. •Initial R&D stage evaluation of turbine prototype design performance was accelerated.•Methodology was illustrated by comparing original and automatically acquired results.•The automated test takes 4 h to acquire approximately 800 data points.