Light-weight tradeoff: Polymer for steel

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Excerpt: Victrex Peek (polyaryletherketone) polymers is said to be a good choice when replacing metal wind-turbine components. The high performance and light-weight material allows up to a 70% weight reduction. This can lower stress on the components and reduce energy needed to power the turbine. The tri …

Make shaft attachments without keyways

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Excerpt: Heavy duty models of the popular ETP Express keyless shaft bushings are now available in 20, 40 and 60-mm sizes. ETP Express shaft locking bushings provide fast and frequent mounting/dismounting capabilities with only one radial screw. This saves space in a system and provides accurate mounting …

Huge steel-plate rolling machine now takes instructions from an iPad

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Excerpt: The largest manufacturer of offshore wind towers in Northern Europe has ordered a new DAVI heavy four-roll machine with the capability rolling steel 4.0-m wide by 145-mm thick. “It’s the largest four-roll machine in the world completely dedicated to building foundations for offshore wind tow …

Welding and Fabricating 101

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Excerpt: Although the U.S. wind energy industry seems forever changing, one of its constant goals is to lower costs by mounting turbines in windier areas, which means offshore and higher up. To take advantage of the stronger and steadier winds in both places, tower manufacturers are looking for ways to reduc …

Machining and Metal Cutting 101

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Excerpt: A speaker at a supply-chain conference remarked that power from a wind turbines will have to compete power from natural gas. Hence, costs will have to come out of components. One way to lower turbine costs is with new manufacturing ideas and equipment. In the machine tool industry, manufacturers hav …

Wind Measurement Systems 101

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Excerpt: Wind measurement systems: Measuring wind speed and direction is now done at least three ways: mechanically (cup anemometer with a vane), with ultrasonics, or with laser-based devices. There are variations to each. Mechanical sensors, for instance, use moving parts and can connect to data recording d …

Engineering & Manufacturing 101

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Excerpt: Like most complex machines, manufacturing a modern wind turbine is the story of materials, processes, and trends. The material story is mostly of composites. For instance, blades in particular are manufactured from fiberglass in an infusion process that excludes air. For other tasks, interest has be …

Molding tips and tricks soon revealed at molding show in Vegas

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Excerpt: Composites One, along with the Closed Mold Alliance and over 15 industry partners, will host  comprehensive, ongoing demonstrations of closed-mold technology –on the show floor – during COMPOSITES 2012 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Presentations will take place in a specially designed staging area …

Software assists designing wind turbines

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Excerpt: Software called Bladed provides wind turbine and component manufacturers, certification agencies, design consultants, and research organizations a design tool that has been extensively validated against measured data from a wide range of turbines. The developer says the software is the industry …

Accurate modeling for slender composite structures (Think blades)

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Excerpt: A provider of efficient high-fidelity modeling software for aerospace, energy composites, and other advanced materials has released VABS 3.6. The developer says the software is the tool of choice for efficient and accurate modeling of composite slender structures such as wind-turbine blades, he …