Single Skin Kite Airfoil Optimization for AWES

Title

Single Skin Kite Airfoil Optimization for AWES

 Author

Coenen, Roger (TU Delft Aerospace Engineering)

Contributor

Schmehl, R. (mentor) ORCID 0000-0002-4112-841X

 Degree granting institution

Delft University of Technology

 Programme

Aerospace Engineering

 Date

2018-12-21

 Abstract

Airborne Wind Energy is a technology where wind energy is harvested with tethered flying devices. Kitepower uses flexible leading edge inflatable kites, but these have a scaling disadvantage in that they become heavier with size. A single skin kite has the potential of negating this disadvantage while at the same time being more aerodynamically efficient.
An airfoil of this type is therefore investigated using Computational Fluid Dynamics and optimized using Surrogate Modelling techniques.
A hybrid mesh was generated with hyperbolic extrusion and triangulation. The RANS solver that was used produced good results.
The results of the optimization were unsatisfactory. The parametrization did not provide enough local control and unique airfoil shapes. The surrogate modelling approach is promising due to the computationally expensive CFD analyses.

 Subject

Kites
Airfoil optimisation
CFD Optimization
CFD

 To reference this document use:

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:fdcf8423-11f0-4b33-956e-3e761635ac41

 Embargo date

2020-12-21

 Part of collection

Student theses

 Document type

master thesis

 Rights

© 2018 Roger Coenen
Files
PDF FinalThesis_RogerCoenen1506862.pdf 7.6 MB
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