Design and Simulation of Small-Scale Horizontal-Axis Wind Turbine with Diffuser Effect

The article presents the results of the investigation of a rotor assembly of a wind turbine with a horizontal axis of rotation. The rotor is equipped with a diffuser which is an integral part of the power generating unit. The research was carried out by means of the ANSYS Fluent software. The geometry used for the tests is a development version of the construction shown in patent application PL 412553 and is characterised by an adjustable angle setting of the rotor blades. The geometric model was obtained by 3D scanning of the actual rotor using the ZScaner scanner ®700. The calculations were carried out for the selected blade angle of attack from 0° to 90° separately for the version with and without the diffuser. The results from the conducted tests were used to determine the characteristics of the power generated by the turbine as a function of rotor speed. The secondary objective of the tests was to analyse the effect of the diffuser on the power generated by the entire rotor assembly.