Vertical Axis Wind Turbine
As part of a lab corresponding with my class in Fluid Dynamics, I built a MATLAB model, performed SolidWorks simulations and built a 13' diameter vertical axis wind turbine. The goal of this project was to build a turbine to generate the maximum electrical energy possible when connected to a DC motor, while being pushed down a 70m hallway. My team (Jay Fleischer, Liam Gallagher and I) had the highest power output (13.3W) out of 25 competing teams.
This 3 week project proved to be a rigorous exercise in rapidly prototyping miniature models, verifying numerical models with experimental data, and scaling prototypes into functioning, full-scale mechanisms using dimensionless analysis.
Our completed turbine, mounted on a DC motor on a wheeled platform for testing day
We conducted simulations on the three proposed turbine geometries to identify max torques, pressure gradients, chatter at certain points of turbine revolution
Our completed turbine, mounted on a DC motor on a wheeled platform for testing day