Measurements of UWB Pulse Propagation Along a Wind Turbine Blade at 1 to 20 GHz

• Published in: 12th European Conference on Antennas and Propagation (EuCAP 2018) : 9-13 April 2018, London, UK
• Main Authors: Hejselbæk, J, Syrytsin, I, Eggers, P
• Format: Conference Proceeding
• Language: English
• Published: Stevenage The Institution of Engineering & Technology 09-04-2018
• Subjects: Deflection; Fast Fourier transformations; Fourier transforms; Frequency response; Line of sight; Pulse propagation; Ray tracing; Turbine blades; Turbines; Wind loads; Wind turbines
• ISBN: 1785618164; 9781785618161
• DOI: 10.1049/cp.2018.0588

This paper describes propagation measurements of an Ultra Wide Band (UWB) pulse along a full-scale wind turbine blade. The aim is to use the UWB channel characteristics to determine the deflection of the wind turbine blade under different wind loads. The frequency response is measured from 1 to 20 GHz and by use of Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) studied the delay domain. It has been found challenging to determine the deflection of the blade only by looking at the delay difference between the Line-Of-Sight (LOS) pulse and a pulse reflected from the blade. To determine from which area of the blade the reflection originates a ray-tracing study incorporating a model of the curvature of the blade have been conducted. This showed the area causing the reflections depended highly on the placement of the antenna on the wind turbine blade.