Parametric Study of Drivetrain Dynamics of a Wind Turbine Using the Multibody Dynamics

Wind energy has become one of the most cost-effective and environmental friendly renewable energy resources among all exploited renewable energy. However, the failure of gearbox contributes most of the downtime for wind turbine system. Dynamic properties of drivetrain, including gearbox should be investigated in detail further. In present paper, a mathematical model for a horizontal axis wind turbine drivetrain was developed using the torsional multibody dynamic model. The drivetrain in this study consisted of a low-speed planetary gear stage (three identical planets with spur teeth, sun and fixed ring gears) and two high-speed spur gear stages. This typical arrangement has been commonly used in the wind turbine industry. Based on this model, this paper aims to investigate the influence of drivetrain parameters on the dynamic response of the wind turbine. The dynamic responses of the turbine with different rotor inertia and generator inertia are compared. Then the difference due to changing of the shaft stiffness is also investigated during and after the transient condition. This parametric study shows that lower rotor inertia and generator inertia could lead to more oscillations.