CHALMERS

UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
Reduction of Wind Turbine Blade Model

M. Khorsand Vakilzadeh





Department of Applied Mechanics,
Chalmers University of Technology,
Gothenburg, Sweden.

CHALMERS
UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
M. Khorsand Vakilzadeh, T. Abrahamsson 2
Outline of the Thesis
Model validation of wind turbine rotor blade will be considered in two levels:

1- A detailed structural dynamics model which has good correlation with
experimental of wind turbine testing.
A FEM model motivated by its connection to the observed physical
phenomena, such as wing twisting, nonlinear effects, spatial or
temporal load variations.

2- A low-order model needs to be validated by a good model-to-model
correlation.
It gives a correct representation of the stimuli-to-response
characteristics of the system in an efficient
simulation environment.

CHALMERS
UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
M. Khorsand Vakilzadeh, T. Abrahamsson 3
Outline of the Thesis
High-order blade model based
on 5-MW reference wind
turbine defined by National
Renewable Energy Laboratory.
Apply developed modal
reduction method based on
input-output relation
preservation
Low-order model
Low-order beam model based
on 5-MW reference wind
turbine defined by National
Renewable Energy Laboratory.
CHALMERS
UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
M. Khorsand Vakilzadeh, T. Abrahamsson 4
High-order model of NREL blade
A master thesis has been defined to build a high-
order blade model based on 5-MW reference wind
turbine defined by National Renewable Energy
Laboratory.


CHALMERS
UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
M. Khorsand Vakilzadeh, T. Abrahamsson 5
High-order model of NREL blade


CHALMERS
UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
M. Khorsand Vakilzadeh, T. Abrahamsson 6
An Improved Modal Approach For Model Reduction Based On Input-
output Relation-Presented in ISMA2012 and would be submitted as journal paper
Structural dynamics
model
Model reduction
Modal truncation
Complex structures
Large FE models
Time consuming
and computationally
intensive
Simple low-order
models
Keep important
features
Approximation
error
A tradeoff between
accuracy and
simplicity
Can handle very
large models with
lightly damped or
unstable modes
Keep the dominant
eigenvalue subset of
the full system
Lack of a general
modal dominancy
analysis
CHALMERS
UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
M. Khorsand Vakilzadeh, T. Abrahamsson 7
An Improved Modal Approach For Model Reduction Based On Input-
output Relation-Presented in ISMA2012 and would be submitted as journal paper
An improved modal based model reduction containing dominant eigensolutions of the
full order model

Dominancy metric: the squared norm contribution of each eigensolution to the system
output.





Numerical example: FE based model of an aluminum plate
Advantages
Computationally efficient
Detection and elimination of unobservable and uncontrollable modes
CHALMERS
UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
M. Khorsand Vakilzadeh, T. Abrahamsson 8
Modal Truncation
Consider a continuous, linear, time invariant, asymptotically stable dynamic system


where x(t) , u(t) , y(t) .
Lets assume that system is diagonalizable as





( ) ( ) ( )
( ) ( ) ( )
x t Ax t Bu t
y t Cx t Du t
= +
= +

( ) ( ) ( )

( ) ( ) ( )
z t z t Bu t
y t Cz t Du t
= A +
= +
| |
1
1 2
1
1
2
1 2
( , ,..., ) ,

.
n
n
n
diag A
b
b
B B
b
C C c c c

A = = u u
(
(
(
= u =
(
(
(

= u =
x
n
u
n y
n
where
Au = Au ( ) ( ) x t z t = u
CHALMERS
UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
M. Khorsand Vakilzadeh, T. Abrahamsson 9
Modal Truncation

( ) ( ) ( )

( ) ( ) ( )
z t z t Bu t
y t Cz t Du t
= A +
= +
1 1 1 1
2 2 2
2
1
1 2
2

0
0

z z B
u
z z
B
z
y C C Du
z
(
A
( ( (
= +
(
( ( (
A
(

(
(
= +
(


1 1 1

( , , , )
r
B C D E = A
Truncated system
Properties
.
H

-norm of error system is upper bounded

1
A c A
| |
1

( )
( ) ( ) sup ( ( ) ( ))
Re( )
n
i i
r r
s i
i k
i
c b
G s G s G s G s
o
o

e
= +
= s

where
z1
k
Challenge
What are the dominant eigenvalues!?!
CHALMERS
UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
M. Khorsand Vakilzadeh, T. Abrahamsson 10
Modal Dominancy Analysis

i i i i
i i i
z z bu
y c z
= +
A =
1

( )
i i i i
Y c s bU

A =
0
( )
H
i i i
M y y dt

= A A
}
0
( ( ) ( ))
H
i i i
M Y Y d e e e

= A A
}
0
1 1


H H
i i i i i
i i
M b c c b d
j j
e
e e

=

}
( )
1

arctan( )
Re( ) Re( )
i
H H
i i i i i
i i
Im
M b c c b

(
=
(

( ) ( ) ( )

( ) ( ) ( )
z t z t Bu t
y t Cz t Du t
= A +
= +
Define dominancy metric as
Extract i
th
modal
coordinate
Laplace
transform
Parsevals
Theorem
u(t) is a zero mean white noise with
unit intensity, U(s)=1
CHALMERS
UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
M. Khorsand Vakilzadeh, T. Abrahamsson 11
Modal Dominancy Analysis
( )
1

arctan( )
Re( ) Re( )
i
H H
i i i i i
i i
Im
M b c c b

(
=
(

Properties
Computationally efficient,
Able to detect the unobservable and uncontrollable modes,
Applicable for both real and complex eigenvalues,
Independent from the other eigensolutions.
CHALMERS
UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
M. Khorsand Vakilzadeh, T. Abrahamsson 12
Improved Modal Truncation Algorithm
O Given the stable system (A, B, C, D).
O Solve eigenvalue problem ( ) for A.
O Transfer the system to modal decomposed form.
O Find multiple eigenvalues with dimension of multiplicity larger than the dimension of the
loading, n
u
.
O Do QR decomposition of to make the eigenvectors found in step 4 orthogonal to load.
O Compute the metric correspond to each modal coordinate.
O Rearrange the modal coordinates as they appear in order:

O Set the limit for error resulted from truncation and compute the low-order model order.
O Do modal truncation along with residualization.
, u A

B
1 2
...
n
M M M > > >
CHALMERS
UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
M. Khorsand Vakilzadeh, T. Abrahamsson 13
Aluminum plate
Dimension: 500 500 1mm
Density: 2700kg/m
3

Youngs modulus: 70 GPa
Poissons ratio: 0.33
4-noded shell elements
16 16 elements mesh
Rayleigh viscous damping of

Numerical Example

3 6
10 , 10 o |

= =
V M K o | = +

CHALMERS
UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
M. Khorsand Vakilzadeh, T. Abrahamsson 14
Results
-7 -6 -5 -4 -3 -2 -1 0
x 10
4
0
0.5
1
1.5
2
2.5
3
3.5
4
x 10
5
radian/seconds
r
a
d
i
a
n
/
s
e
c
o
n
d
s
N=3468
For the full state space model
Eigenvalue spectrum of full model; eigenvalues with positive imaginary part
N=1710
Guyan reduction is applied to remove massless rotational DOFs
CHALMERS
UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
M. Khorsand Vakilzadeh, T. Abrahamsson 15
-800 -600 -400 -200 0
0
1
2
3
4
x 10
4
radian/seconds
r
a
d
i
a
n
/
s
e
c
o
n
d
s


Bal. Trunc.,k=288
Prop. Mod. Trunc.,k=288
-800 -600 -400 -200 0
0
1
2
3
4
x 10
4
radian/seconds
r
a
d
i
a
n
/
s
e
c
o
n
d
s


Bal. Trunc., k=250
Prop. Mod. Trunc., k=250
-800 -600 -400 -200 0
0
1
2
3
4
x 10
4
radian/seconds
r
a
d
i
a
n
/
s
e
c
o
n
d
s


Bal. Trunc., k=200
Prop. Mod. Trunc., k=200
-1200 -1000 -800 -600 -400 -200 0
0
1
2
3
4
x 10
4
radian/seconds
r
a
d
i
a
n
/
s
e
c
o
n
d
s


Bal. Trunc., k=150
Prop. Mod. Trunc., k=150
Eigenvalue spectrum of low-order models of plate;
eigenvalues with positive imaginary part
CHALMERS
UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
M. Khorsand Vakilzadeh, T. Abrahamsson 16
Numerical statistics for reduced-order models with proposed modal truncation and balanced truncation using unit-impulse input signal; The Frobenius norm of the full system
output is 29.34 and the H

-norm of the full system is 28.42.

Proposed Modal Truncation Method Balanced Truncation
Reduced-Order
Model
RHN of the error
system (%)
RFN of the error
system (%)
Reduction time
(s)
RHN of the error
system (%)
RFN of the error
system (%)
Reduction time
(s)
k = 100 3.6e-4 0.74 9.36 4.7e-5 0.28 68.07
k = 50 8.9e-4 1.83 9.53 1.7e-4 1.33 67.99
k = 20 1.4e-2 4.66 9.19 2.6e-3 4.96 68.12
Numerical Statistics - Comparison with Balanced Truncation
Relative Frobenius norm of error
Time domain analysis
Relative H

-norm of error system -

Frequency domain analysis
2
1 1
2
1 1
y
y
n
m
ij
r i j
F F
n
m
F F
ij
i j
e
e y y
y y
y
= =
= =

= =

r
G G
G

CHALMERS
UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
M. Khorsand Vakilzadeh, T. Abrahamsson 17
Displacement as output, n
r
=20 Acceleration as output, n
r
=150
Method
RHN of the error
system (%)
RFN of the error
system (%)
RHN of the error
system (%)
RFN of the error
system (%)
Davison 0.19 16.01 3.08 96.40
Rommes 0.01 5.35 0.88 43.84
Aguirre 0.015 6.79 46.80 31.68
Proposed method 0.02 4.66 16.52 21.90
Numerical Statistics Comparison with other dominancy definitions
Relative Frobenius norm of error
Time domain analysis
Relative H

-norm of error system -

Frequency domain analysis
2
1 1
2
1 1
y
y
n
m
ij
r i j
F F
n
m
F F
ij
i j
e
e y y
y y
y
= =
= =

= =

r
G G
G

CHALMERS
UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
M. Khorsand Vakilzadeh, T. Abrahamsson 18
Conclusion
A new dominancy index is suggested to measure and rank the contribution of modes into
input-output relation:
- Squared norm of output deviation resulted from deflation of eigensolutions from
the system
The explicit formulation resulted from decomposed metric decreases computation time
needed for model reduction.
Comparison to balanced truncation showed that:
O For a given model order, the balanced truncation is superior in approximation accuracy in
frequency domain analysis while the proposed modal truncation is superior in time domain
analysis.
O Obtained low-order model includes a subset of the eigenvalues of the full model, same
physical interpretation, while balanced truncation alters the system eigenvalues.
O The time required for reduction is decreased due to the explicit form of dominancy index as
compared with balancing reduction techniques.


CHALMERS
UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
M. Khorsand Vakilzadeh, T. Abrahamsson 19
Conclusion
Comparison to other dominancy definitions showed that:
O In a time domain analysis the proposed modal reduction technique yields less
approximation error.
This method can be efficiently applied to very large-scale dynamics systems
while the application of the balanced truncation is restricted for very large-scale
systems inasmuch as the solution of the Lyapunov equation is required in this
method.
CHALMERS
UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
M. Khorsand Vakilzadeh, T. Abrahamsson 20
Future Works
Now it is time to apply the described input-output based modal reduction method
on the high-order model of NREL blade to obtain the reduced-order model.

On the other hand, the state-of-the-art beam element based low-order model
would be developed to be compared with the reduced-order model in regard to
their input-output relation preservation.
CHALMERS
UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY
SWPTC
Nov. 2012
THANKS FOR YOUR ATTENTION