Renewable Energy xxx (2014) 1e10

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Renewable Energy
j o u r n a l h o m e p a g e : w w w . e l s e v i e r . c o m/ l o c a t e / r e n e n e

Effects of end plates with various shapes and sizes on helical Savonius wind
turbines
Keum Soo Jeon a, Jun Ik Jeong b, Jae-Kyung Pan c, Ki-Wahn Ryu d, *
a Wind Valley Co. Ltd., Suncheon 540-856, Republic of Korea
b
Euro-Korea Co. Ltd., Jeonju 561-843, Republic of Korea
c
Department of Electrical Engineering and Smart Grid Research Center, Chonbuk National University, Jeonju 561-756, Republic of Korea
d
Department of Aerospace Engineering, Chonbuk National University, Jeonju 561-756, Republic of Korea

article info abstract

Article history: We experimentally studied the effects of end plates with various shapes and sizes on the aerodynamic performance of helical
Received 14 March 2014 Savonius wind turbines with twist angles of 180 and two semicircular buckets. To apply the blockage correction method and
Accepted 12 November 2014 investigate the effect of end plate, four different helical Savonius wind turbines were tested at a subsonic open-circuit type
Available online xxx
wind tunnel. The adapted Maskell's blockage correction method suggested by Alexander was adopted for the wind turbine
model installed in a closed test section of the subsonic wind tunnel. In order to clarify the end plate effect, power and torque
Keywords:
coefficients were measured with various end plate shapes and areas. The use of both upper and lower end plates significantly
Helical Savonius wind turbine
increases the power coefficient by 36% compared with no end plates. We found that the Maskell's blockage correction method
Power coefficient
Static torque for straight Savonius wind turbines is applicable to helical Savonius wind turbines for small blockage ratios ranging from 3 to
End plate 8.3%. It was also observed that the power coefficient increases linearly in proportion to the area of the end plate.
Blockage correction
Subsonic wind tunnel
2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Savonius wind turbines have many advantages, including a high starting
torque, a simple design, and an ability to operate in any wind direction,
though they have low aerodynamic efficiency. Thus Savonius wind turbines
are widely used in micro and small scale wind turbine applications, such as
domestic and residential power generation. Much work has been done
studying the aerodynamic characteristics and effects of geometric design
parameters in Savonius wind turbines [1e3]. However, conventional (or
straight) Savonius wind turbines have a negative torque at certain rotation
angles and a large torque variation. To improve the torque char-acteristics,
multi-stage, out of phase Savonius wind turbines have been proposed, but the
use of a multi-stage blade reduces the po-wer coefficient [4,5].
At present, some researchers have proposed helical Savonius wind
turbines with twist angles of 90 and 180 and have investi-gated the effects of
geometric parameters such as the overlap ratio, aspect ratio and shaft interface
[6e8]. Helical Savonius wind tur-bines have a positive static torque
coefficient for all rotor angles and better performance than conventional
Savonius wind turbines.
* Corresponding author. Tel.: 82 63 270 4286; fax: 82 63 270 2472.
E-mail address: kwryu@chonbuk.ac.kr (K.-W. Ryu).
The use of end plates is the simplest method to increase the aerodynamic
performance of Savonius wind turbines. Many re-searchers have
experimentally studied the influence of end plates in conventional Savonius
wind turbines without blade twist [9e11]. In particular, Ushiyama and Nagai
[10] suggested optimal design configurations for Savonius rotors with straight
buckets. They car-ried out a parametric study of the aspect ratio, the overlap
and separation gap between rotor buckets, the presence or absence of rotor
end plates, and the influence of bucket stacking, but they did not apply
blockage correction (although they conducted the ex-periments at an open test
section about 1 m downwind from the exit of the wind tunnel to avoid
blockage effects).
In the wind tunnel experiments, the end plate effects of the helical
Savonius wind turbines are hard to identify whilst those of the straight
Savonius wind turbines are frequent. In particular, partially blocked non-
circular end plates rather than circular ones are expected in the industry to
decrease the cost and weight of the rotor. Power performance with the various
shapes of the end plate then becomes one of the most contested points.
Because the Savonius wind turbine is the typical drag type, the drag forces at
the advancing and retreating sides generate negative and positive torque
respectively. We presume that the role of the end plate is to prevent spill-over
flow at both ends of the bucket, and

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2014.11.035
0960-1481/ 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Please cite this article in press as: Jeon KS, et al., Effects of end plates with various shapes and sizes on helical Savonius wind turbines, Renewable Energy
(2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2014.11.035
2 K.S. Jeon et al. / Renewable Energy xxx (2014) 1e10

Nomenclature P power
q dynamic pressure; rU2/2
AR aspect ratio; H/D R rotor radius
AC cross-sectional area; pR2 Re Reynolds number
AE end plate area S rotor swept area
BR blockage ratio T torque
C
t torque coefficient; T/(qSR) TS static torque
C
ts static torque coefficient; TS/(qSR) U wind speed
CP power coefficient; P/(qSU) w width of wind tunnel test section
D rotor diameter r density of air
ER end plate area ratio; AE/AC l tip speed ratio; UR/U
H rotor height U angular speed
h height of wind tunnel test section

consequently increases the momentum transfer from the air stream. The
advancing bucket can reduce the drag force related to the negative torque of
the rotor by eliminating the end plate itself. In other words, partially blocked
non-circular end plates applied just for the retreating side bucket would be
sufficient to absorb the momentum from the impinging air stream. This idea
would fulfill the industry's demand. The above concept is the main
background of this study even if it is physically valid.
Therefore the aim of this study is to experimentally investigate end plate
effects using various shapes and sizes of end plates on the aerodynamic
performance of helical Savonius wind turbines. This is the first study to
conduct such an investigation. The end plate ef-fects were determined in a
subsonic open-circuit type wind tunnel with a closed test section of 1000 mm
1500 mm. Four different helical Savonius wind turbines with identical aspect
ratios, twist angles of 180 , and two semicircular buckets were fabricated
from fiber reinforced plastics. All of the bucket shapes had no separation gaps
or overlaps between the two semicircular buckets. The adapted Maskell's
blockage correction method for the straight Savonius wind turbine model
suggested by Alexander [12,13] was chosen and verified for the helical
Savonius wind turbine model.
(diameter height: 150 mm 300 mm, 200 mm 400 mm, 250 mm 500 mm, and
350 mm 700 mm) were fabricated to study the influence of the blockage ratio
of the wind turbine model. Table 1 lists the details of the rotor diameter, rotor
height, rotor aspect ratio, shaft diameter, and blade thickness. The blades were
made from a fiber reinforced plastic which was a composite ma-terial of a
polymer matrix reinforced with glass fibers.
The helical Savonius wind turbines were designed as shown in Fig. 2. The
end plates were fabricated from an acrylic plate of 5 mm thickness. To study
efficiency according to end plate shape, the diameter of the end plate was the
same as the diameter of the wind turbine. In a conventional Savonius wind
turbine without a blade twist, the optimal diameter of the end plate for
obtaining a maximum power coefficient is 1.1 times the turbine diameter
[9,14]. The end plate area ratios, i.e., the ratio of the end plate area to the
cross-sectional area (AE/AC) of the turbine (diameter 250 mm) are listed in
Table 2.
The static torque coefficient Cts, the torque coefficient Ct, the power
coefficient Cp, and the tip speed ratio l of the turbine are given by.

TS
Cts qSR (1)
2. Experimental model and apparatus

2.1. Model of helical Savonius wind turbines T

Ct qSR (2)
Fig. 1 shows the configuration of the helical Savonius wind turbine with a
twist angle of 180 , two semicircular buckets, and the main shaft without P
overlap or a separation gap. Four different helical Savonius wind turbines
Cp qSU l Ct (3)
with identical aspect ratios of 2.0

Fig. 1. Schematic views of helical Savonius wind turbine without end plates.

Please cite this article in press as: Jeon KS, et al., Effects of end plates with various shapes and sizes on helical Savonius wind turbines, Renewable Energy
(2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2014.11.035
 K.S. Jeon et al. / Renewable Energy xxx (2014) 1e10 3

Table 1 Table 2
Geometric parameters of the helical Savonius wind turbines.

Designation Diameter Height of Aspect Diameter Thickness

of Savonius of rotor (D) rotor (H) ratio (H/D) of shaft (d) of blade (t)
rotors [mm] [mm] [mm] [mm]

HS #1 150 300 2 10 4
HS #2 200 400 2 15 4
HS #3 250 500 2 25 4
HS #4 350 700 2 25 4

UR l
U

where TS is the static torque at a fixed rotational angle [N-m], T is the

2
torque [N-m], q rU /2 is the dynamic pressure [Pa], R is the rotor radius
2
[m], S is the swept area [m ], P TU is the wind power [W], U is the free
stream speed [m/s], and U is the angular speed of the rotor [rad/s].
The aspect ratio AR and the end plate area ratio ER are given by

H
AR D

ER
AE
AC

where H is the height of the turbine, AE is the area of the end plate, and AC is
the cross-sectional area of the wind turbine perpendicular to the rotating axis, i.e. AC
2
pR .
The blockage ratio is the ratio between the maximum projected area and the
cross-sectional area of the wind turbine model. The formula of the blockage
ratio, BR, is:

HD
BR hw

where h and w denote the height and width of the wind tunnel test section,
respectively.

2.2. Experimental apparatus

Fig. 3 (a) and (b) show schematic diagrams of the experimental apparatus
and the open-circuit type subsonic wind tunnel used in
Details of end plates on the helical Savonius wind turbine with a diameter of 250 mm. AE [mm2] 0 7990 13,510 26,220 50,670
AE/AC 0 0.15 0.27 0.52 1
W/o end End End End End
plates plate #1 plate #2 plate #3 plate #4
this study. The dimension of the cross section at the test section is 1000 mm
1500 mm with a maximum velocity of 20 m/s. The
(4) experiments were performed at air speeds ranging from 6 m/s to 12 m/s. The
rated torque and repeatability resolution for the
DACELL TRD-2K digital torque detector adopted for measurements are 19.6
Nm and 0.2% (0.0392 Nm) respectively. It is presumed that the torque
detector ensures reliability because the interest range of the measured torque
(0.045e0.072 Nm) for the smallest possible size for the wind turbine case,
i.e., D 150 mm, is in the tolerance range. The uncertainty of the
measurement can be increased due to the value being smaller than 1% of the
rated torque. To reduce

(5) uncertainty, the average mean values of five data points measured within 1 min was used
in this study.
The static torque was measured at fixed blade rotation angles

(6) every 4 of rotation using the brake function of the servo motor. The rotating torque
was measured by changing the rotational speed of
the turbines under a steady wind speed. The rotational speed was changed by
regulating the rotational speed of the AC servo motor.

3. Results and discussion

Previous studies [9,10] investigating end plate effects for Savo-nius wind
turbines presented the test results without blockage

(7) correction. In particular wind tunnel experiments using closed test section can lead to
erroneous understanding or conclusions
regarding aerodynamic performance and trend. Moreover, the adapted
Maskell's blockage correction method suggested by Alex-ander [12,13] was
developed initially not for the helical Savonius wind turbine but for the
straight Savonius wind turbine.
To examine the effects of end plate shapes on aerodynamic performance
in more detail, verification by comparing the aero-dynamic data with the
values obtained after blockage correction would be a prerequisite.
Specifically, the Maskell's blockage

Fig. 2. Views of helical Savonius rotors with various shapes and sizes of end plates.

Please cite this article in press as: Jeon KS, et al., Effects of end plates with various shapes and sizes on helical Savonius wind turbines, Renewable Energy
(2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2014.11.035
4 K.S. Jeon et al. / Renewable Energy xxx (2014) 1e10

Fig. 3. The schematic diagram of experimental apparatus and the open-circuit subsonic wind tunnel.

correction method would be applicable to helical Savonius wind turbines for
verifying that deviations of the performance curves for various blockage
ratios decreased noticeably after blockage correction. After confirming the
reliability of the Maskell's blockage correction method for the helical
Savonius wind turbine, we analyzed the influence of the end plate shapes and
sizes on the power coefficients in the next step.
Therefore, we performed the following steps to advance the wind tunnel
experiments for the helical Savonius wind turbine. First, the corrected power
and torque coefficients according to the tip speed ratio at the same wind speed
were compared with non-corrected values. Second, comparison of the
aerodynamic data such as power and torque coefficients before and after
blockage correction was carried out at a similar Reynolds number range. We
were then able to check the deviations of the aerodynamic data for the first
and the second steps. Finally, after verifying the Maskell's blockage
correction method for the helical Savonius wind turbine, the influence of the
end plate shapes and sizes on the aerodynamic performances was
investigated.
3.1. Blockage correction
Testing at an open test section may also lead to blockage effects, and so
all of the power and torque curves should be corrected using a suitable
correction method. Blockage effects typically occur in wind tunnel tests and
become more critical as the blockage ratio increases. Therefore, an
appropriate blockage correction method is imperative for all wind tunnel tests,
including both closed and open

Please cite this article in press as: Jeon KS, et al., Effects of end plates with various shapes and sizes on helical Savonius wind turbines, Renewable Energy
(2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2014.11.035
 K.S. Jeon et al. / Renewable Energy xxx (2014) 1e10 5

Fig. 4. Blockage correction factors, m, according to the blockage ratios for the straight
Savonius wind turbine.

test sections. Ross and Altman presented a review paper studying various
blockage correction methods such as the wall pressure method, Pope's
method, and Maskell's methods for Savonius rotors using their own wind
tunnel test results [15]. They also found that wake constriction is strongly
influenced by rotating bluff buckets.
In this study, Maskell's correction method was used because it is very
effective for correcting the blockage effect for a blunt body [12,15].
Alexander [13] suggested the following adapted Maskell's blockage
correction method to predict wind tunnel correction for Savonius rotors:

2
U 1
C
2
1 m BR
(8)

U
where UC is the corrected air speed, U is the undisturbed air speed at the
inlet of the test section, and m denotes the ratio of wake area normal to the
wind direction at the maximum frontal area of the wind turbine model. The
correction parameter of m 3.02, 2.86, 2.66, and 2.77 are used for D 150,
200, 250, and 350 mm respectively, based on the correction value in Ref. [12]
and Fig. 4.
The experiments were mainly carried out using helical Savonius wind
turbines with D 150 mm (BR 3%), 200 mm (BR 5.3%), and 250 mm
(BR 8.3%), keeping the aspect ratio constant at AR 2. Both the upper
and lower end plates were circular, as shown in Fig. 2(e) and Table 3.
Fig. 5 shows the uncorrected power coefficients and torque coefficients for
the similar Reynolds number when U 12 m/s for BR 3% (Re 1.24
5 5
10 ), U 10 m/s for BR 5.3% (Re 1.38 10 ), U 8 m/s for BR
5 5
8.3% (Re 1.38 10 ), and U 6 m/s for BR 16% (Re 1.44 10 ). For
the similar Reynolds number, we observed that the power coefficients
increased in
Table 3
Results of the blockage correction using the adapted Maskell's method.
D BR U Before correction After correction Change
[mm] [%] [m/s]
Cpmax
l at Cpmax Cpmax l at Cpmax of Cpmax [%] of l at
Fig. 5. The uncorrected power coefficient and torque coefficient when U 12 m/s for BR
3%, U 10 m/s for BR 5.3%, U 8 m/s for BR 8.3%, and U 6 m/s for BR 16%.
absolute value, and the locations of the maximum power coeffi-cient shifted
to the right toward higher tip speed ratios when the blockage ratio increased.
Fig. 6 shows the corrected results of the power and torque curves
corresponding to Fig. 5. The power coef-ficient was decreased over the whole
tip speed ratio range, compared to the uncorrected data. It was observed that
the larger the blockage ratio, the higher the reduction of the power coefficient
for the similar Reynolds number. From these results, the adapted Maskell's
blockage correction method for straight Savonius wind turbines suggested by
Alexander yields well corrected results for helical Savonius wind turbines in
similar Reynolds number ranges.
Fig. 7 (a) and (b) show the uncorrected power and torque curves with BR
3%, 5.3%, and 8.3% at a fixed air speed of 10 m/s. We observed that the
power coefficients were markedly increased in absolute value, and the
locations of the maximum power co-efficient were shifted to the right toward
higher tip speed ratios when the blockage ratio is increased. This is because
Change the wind velocity increases due to increased flow constriction caused by a
larger body in the test section, which increases the swept area of the turbine.
Cpmax [%]

150 3 10 0.0906 0.5184 0.0786 0.4943 13.2 4.6

200 5.3 10 0.1116 0.6074 0.0.087 0.5591 22.0 8.0 Fig. 8 shows the corrected results of the power and torque curves
250 8.3 10 0.1349 0.6528 0.0928 0.5762 31.2 11.7 corresponding to Fig. 7. The power coefficient was

Please cite this article in press as: Jeon KS, et al., Effects of end plates with various shapes and sizes on helical Savonius wind turbines, Renewable Energy
(2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2014.11.035
6 K.S. Jeon et al. / Renewable Energy xxx (2014) 1e10
Fig. 6. The corrected power coefficient and torque coefficient when U 12 m/s for
BR 3%, U 10 m/s for BR 5.3%, U 8 m/s for BR 8.3%, and U 6 m/s for BR 16%.
decreased over the whole tip speed ratio range, compared to the uncorrected
data. In particular, the corrected power curves lie close together under the
various blockage ratios, especially in the low tip speed ratio range. Table 3
shows the results of blockage correction using the adapted Maskell's method.
The correction reduces the maximum power coefficients (Cpmax) by 13.2%,
22.0%, and 31.2% for BR 3.0%, 5.3%, and 8.3%, respectively. It was
observed that the larger the blockage ratio, the higher the reduction of the
power coefficient. Leftward shifts of the tip speed ratios corresponding to the
maximum power coefficients were also observed after correction of the
blockage. All of the corrected power and torque curves were shifted leftward
and downward, compared with the uncorrected values. For fixed air speeds
with various blockage ratios up to 10%, the adapted Maskell's blockage
correction method also produced well corrected results for the helical
Savonius wind turbine.
Fig. 9 illustrates the uncorrected power and torque curves at various wind
speeds when BR 3.0%, BR 5.3%, and BR 8.3%. For the small
blockage ratio (BR 3%), the curves of the power co-efficients at various
wind speeds ranging from 8 to 12 m/s were close together. For the large ratios
(BR 5.3% and BR 8.3%), however, the power coefficients increased
according to increases in
Please cite this article in press as: Jeon KS, et al., Effects of end plates with various shapes and sizes on helical Savonius wind turbines, Renewable Energy
(2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2014.11.035
Fig. 7. The uncorrected power coefficient and torque coefficient at the wind speed of
10 m/s when BR 3%, 5.3%, and 8.3%.
the wind speed while the tip speed ratio corresponding to the maximum
power coefficient was nearly fixed.
Fig. 10 shows the corrected results of the power and torque curves
corresponding to the results shown in Fig. 9 after applying the adapted
Maskell's blockage correction method suggested by Alexander [13]. The
power coefficient was reduced in the whole tip speed ratio range. For the
small blockage ratio of 3%, the correction decreased the maximum power
coefficient by about 13%. For the larger blockage ratios of 5.5% and 8.3%,
the maximum power co-efficients were decreased by about 22% and 31%,
respectively. To summarize, we found that the larger the blockage ratio, the
higher the reduction in the power coefficient. The power coefficients at BR
3%, BR 5.3%, and BR 8.3% were similar in the low tip speed ratio
range. The tip speed ratios corresponding to the maximum power coefficients
were also decreased after the blockage correction.
This study shows that the adapted Maskell's blockage correction method
suggested by Alexander [13] exhibits coalescing trends for both the power
and torque curves, and that the correction method is appropriate and useful for
assessing the aerodynamic perfor-mance of helical Savonius wind turbines.
 K.S. Jeon et al. / Renewable Energy xxx (2014) 1e10 7

effect in helical Savonius wind turbines with a twist of 180 , the power and
torque coefficients were measured under different conditions: without end
plates, with lower end plate only, and with both the upper and lower end
plates for each blade. Fig. 12 shows the measured power and torque curves
for the helical Savonius wind turbine (D 200 mm) at a fixed wind speed of
10 m/s. All of the figures in this section show corrected results using the
adapted Maskell's blockage correction method. The use of both upper and
lower end plates significantly increased the power coefficient by 36%
compared with no end plate. It was observed that the power curves lie close
together under the various end plate conditions in the range of low tip speed.

The power and torque coefficient were measured to investigate the

influence of the end plate shape, as shown in Fig. 2. Fig. 13 shows the
corrected power and torque curves under various end plate shapes at a fixed
air speed of 10 m/s. The figure shows that the power coefficient changes
significantly with variations in end plate shape. Fig. 14 (a) and (b) show the
change of the maximum power coefficient and the tip speed ratio
corresponding to the maximum power coefficient according to the end plate
area ratio (ER AE/AC). The maximum power coefficient and the tip speed
ratio corre-sponding to the maximum power coefficient increased linearly

Fig. 8. The corrected power coefficient and torque coefficient at the wind speed of 10 m/s when

BR 3%, 5.3%, and 8.3%.

3.2. Static torque

Fig. 11 shows the static torque coefficient measured at every 4 of rotation

for a helical Savonius wind turbine with a diameter of 350 mm and two
circular end plates, at a wind speed of 6 m/s. The angle of the rotor is the
angle between the direction perpendicular to the chord line of the rotor and
the free stream direction at the rotor's upper plane, as shown in Fig. 11. The
helical Savonius wind turbine has a positive static torque coefficient for all
rotor angles. It was found that the static torque coefficients are nearly zero at
rotor angles around 30 and 210 , and undergo a large variation near the
maximum static torque coefficients. The maximum static torque was detected
at rotor angles of 0 and 180 .

3.3. The effects of end plates of various shapes and sizes

In Section 3.1 we verified the reliability of the Maskell's blockage

correction method for the helical Savonius wind turbine. In this section we
will analyze the influence of the end plate shapes and sizes on the power Fig. 9. The uncorrected power coefficient and torque coefficient at different wind speeds when
coefficients. In order to clarify the end plate
BR 3.0%, BR 5.3%, and BR 8.3%.

Please cite this article in press as: Jeon KS, et al., Effects of end plates with various shapes and sizes on helical Savonius wind turbines, Renewable Energy
(2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2014.11.035
8 K.S. Jeon et al. / Renewable Energy xxx (2014) 1e10
Fig. 10. The corrected power coefficient and torque coefficient at different wind speeds when
BR 3.0%, BR 5.3%, and BR 8.3%.
Fig. 11. The measured static torque coefficient of the helical Savonius wind turbine with a
diameter of 350 mm at a wind speed of 6 m/s.
Please cite this article in press as: Jeon KS, et al., Effects of end plates with various shapes and sizes on helical Savonius wind turbines, Renewable Energy
(2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2014.11.035
Fig. 12. The power and torque coefficient of the helical Savonius wind turbines
(D 200 mm) with and without end plates at the wind speed of 10 m/s.
with the end plate area ratio. We expect that the circular end plate at the
advancing bucket deflects more air flow into the retreating rotor which can
produce more power. From these parametric studies, we conclude that the
main cause of these variations comes from changes in the end plate area.
The end plate is able to decrease spanwise spillage which rep-resents loss
of the aerodynamic torque generated from the buckets. Therefore, the larger
the end plate area, the higher the aerodynamic power. Based on this study, the
use of circular end plates at both ends of the rotor is the best way to increase
the aerodynamic performance of helical Savonius wind turbines.
4. Conclusion
We experimentally studied the effects of end plates on the aerodynamic
performance of helical Savonius wind turbines with a twist angle of 180 and
two semicircular buckets. In order to investigate both the blockage correction
method and the end plate effect, four different helical Savonius wind turbines
were tested using a subsonic open-circuit type wind tunnel. The adapted
 K.S. Jeon et al. / Renewable Energy xxx (2014) 1e10
Fig. 13. The torque and power coefficient of the helical Savonius wind turbines (D 250 mm)
with end plates of various shapes and sizes at the wind speed of 10 m/s.
Maskell's blockage correction method was used for the wind tur-bine model
installed in the closed test section of the wind tunnel.
In this study, the adapted Maskell's blockage correction method for
straight Savonius wind turbines suggested by Alexander was adequately
verified for helical Savonius wind turbines. Further-more, from the
experiments with various shapes and sizes of end plates, the assumption that
the partially blocked non-circular end plates at the retreating side bucket
would be sufficient to absorb the momentum from the impinging air stream is
not as effective as we had initially expected.
Consequently, the end plate effect shows that the maximum power
coefficient and its tip speed ratio linearly increase with the end plate area ratio
up to 1.0. Therefore, it turns out that the circular end plate is the best choice
for maximizing power and torque co-efficients for helical Savonius wind
turbines. The use of both upper and lower circular end plates significantly
increased the power coefficient by 36% compared with no end plate. We
expect that the circular end plate deflects more air flow into the retreating
bucket and the flow structure would be explained in future works based on the
CFD or other flow visualization.
Please cite this article in press as: Jeon KS, et al., Effects of end plates with various shapes and sizes on helical Savonius wind turbines, Renewable Energy
(2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2014.11.035
9
Fig. 14. The change of the maximum power coefficient and the tip speed ration cor-responding
to the maximum power coefficient as a function of the end plate area ratio (ER AE/AC).
Acknowledgments
This paper was supported by research funds of Chonbuk Na-tional
University in 2010. This work was supported by the New and Renewable
Energy grant of the Korea Institute of Energy Technol-ogy Evaluation and
Planning (KETEP), funded by the Korean Min-istry of Trade, Industry and
Energy. This work was also supported by a National Research Foundation of
Korea (NRF) grant funded by the Korea government (MSIP) (2010-0028509).
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Please cite this article in press as: Jeon KS, et al., Effects of end plates with various shapes and sizes on helical Savonius wind turbines, Renewable Energy
(2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2014.11.035