Research on Testing the Ultrasonic Wind

Sensors in Circuit Wind Tunnel

Min Huang, Huiguo Lu, Baoqiang Wang and Yong Lu

Abstract Ultrasonic anemometer is suitable of a variety of industries which have

wind demand because of the small start of wind speed, no moving parts, not
destroying the wind farm and high accuracy. However, ultrasound test procedures
related to wind measurements has not formalized in china. This article selected speed
test point drawing on the wind cup test procedures and tests each point at different
angles in the HDF-720 low-speed wind tunnel loop. The test results found that the
ultrasonic wind sensor can be installed in a large wind tunnel for testing, but in the
same wind speed, results of the measurement are slightly different at different angles
due to the existence of wind instrument sensor shadow effect. Moreover, for different
wind speeds, the differences are also different. Combined with the above test anal-
ysis, we must correct the measurement following the ultrasonic sensor installation
angle when using ultrasonic anemometer to measure wind speed in real time.

Keywords Test ⋅ Ultrasonic anemometer ⋅ Circuit wind tunnel ⋅ Error

analysis

1 Introduction

In the measurement of surface wind, the main test methods are mechanical, hot
bulb, laser, ultrasonic, etc. [1], which are widely used to measure the surface wind.
Mechanical sensors are subject to wear due to rotation, low measurement, large
rotating inertia, and there are start-up wind speed. The mechanical moving parts of
the ultrasonic sensor [2–6] are from the influence of the start wind speed and the
inertia, having the advantage of fast response speed and high measurement accu-
racy. The main methods for measuring the velocity of ultrasonic sensors are vortex
street method, correlation function method, Doppler method, time-difference
method [1]. Vortex street method can only measure wind speed in one direction.

M. Huang (✉) ⋅ H. Lu ⋅ B. Wang ⋅ Y. Lu

Electronic Engineering College, CUIT, Chengdu 610225, China
e-mail: huangmin08@163.com

© Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2016 859

Q. Liang et al. (eds.), Proceedings of the 2015 International Conference
on Communications, Signal Processing, and Systems, Lecture Notes
in Electrical Engineering 386, DOI 10.1007/978-3-662-49831-6_89
860 M. Huang et al.

Correlation function method has high accuracy, strong anti-interference ability, but
it is only suitable for measuring air flow in a single direction. Doppler method
calculates wind speed mainly by frequency offset, but this method is greatly
influenced by environment and temperature. Due to the low development level of
ultrasonic sensors in the domestic, a large number of ultrasonic sensors rely on
imports, so ultrasonic wind measurement instrument testing technology is
approximately blank. The methods of wind speed and direction detection based on
ultrasonic time-difference are applied in the paper and test in the loop wind tunnel,
and the result is discussed in this paper.

2 Principle of Ultrasonic Wind Which Is Based

on the Time-Difference Method

The time-difference method [7, 8] uses one pair of 20 cm apart and high sensitivity
ultrasonic probe which can be send and receive signal, a 90° angle layout, the
overall height of 420 mm ultrasonic probe. The shape structure of two-dimensional
ultrasound probe is as shown in Figs. 1 and 2.

Fig. 1 Ultrasonic probe

structure shape

Fig. 2 Two-dimensional 4
ultrasound probe principle

1 2

3
Research on Testing the Ultrasonic Wind Sensors … 861

The distance of two ultrasonic sensors is d, When the ultrasonic wave spread
between No. 1 and 2 probes, the propagation time of downwind and headwind is
respectivelyt12 , t21 . The frequencies are f12 , f21 , frequency difference is Δfx ; Simi-
larly, when the ultrasonic wave spread between No. 3 and 4 probes, the propagation
time of downwind and headwind are respectively t34 , t43 . The frequencies are
f34 , f43 , frequency difference is Δfy . The spread of ultrasonic wave is vc under the
condition of no wind speed, wind speed is v, winds from the east–west direction is
vx and from the north–south direction is vy , so:

d d d d
t12 = = ; t21 = = ð1Þ
v12 vc + vx v21 vc − vx

By (1), the wind speed vx in east–west direction is deduced:


d 1 1 d d
vx = − = ðf12 − f21 Þ = Δfx ð2Þ
2 t12 t21 2 2

Similarly, the wind in east–west direction is vy :


d 1 1 d d
vy = − = ðf34 − f43 Þ = Δfy ð3Þ
2 t34 t43 2 2

By (2), (3), we can get the actual wind speed and direction as follows:

d 1 1
v= ½ðΔfx Þ2 + ðΔfy Þ2 2 ; θ = arccos Δfx ̸½ðΔfx Þ2 + ðΔfy Þ2 2 ð4Þ
2

3 Ultrasonic Anemometer Test Based on Wind Tunnel

3.1 Wind Speed Detection Device

3.1.1 Wind Tunnel

This experiment adopts the HDF—720 wind tunnel [9] with the diameter of
720 mm, which is suitable for large size ultrasonic probe test. The device has wide
range of wind speed, from 0.05 to 61.5 m/s, the uniformity of velocity’s deviation
is less than 0.5 % and the stability of velocity’s deviation is less than 0.2 %. Wind
speed verification device is made of wind tunnel body piercing, differential pressure
gauge, Frequency converter, fan, computer software, wind and other parts.
862 M. Huang et al.

3.1.2 The Pitot Tube

The main measurement standard device is the second-class pitot tube [10–12] at
low-speed wind tunnel, L-type pitot tube is the most perfect kind of pitot. The Pitot
tube has two inlet pressures, at the top of the probe is inlet total pressure, at the side
of probe is static import. Total pressure and static pressure are tethered through soft
rubber tube and DP-CALC, thus pitot tube differential pressure gauge measurement
system is formed and we can read the differential pressure differential pressure
gauge measuring velocity.

3.2 Standard Wind Measurements

Bernoulli equation [13] derived fluid velocity at work segment is as follows:

sffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi sffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
2 2
V= ðP − P0 Þ = ΔP ð5Þ
ρ ρ

wherein, the calculation formula for air density [14] is ρ = PR0d ðt− +0.378He
273.15Þ , among them,
w

t is the temperature of the flow field, the unit is °C; H is the relative humidity of the
flow field, the unit is %RH; P0 is the ambient atmospheric pressure, the unit is Pa;
ew is the saturation vapor pressure when the flow field temperature is t °C, the unit
is Pa; Rd is the gas constant of dry air, and generally Rd = 287 J/(K ⋅ kg).

4 The Testing Process and Data Analysis

In test experiments, Thies Clima ultrasonic wind measurement instrument made in

Germany was used to test data, which can get real-time wind speed, wind direction
and the actual temperature, the measured values are in the form of digital and
analog output. This ultrasonic anemometer has the advantage of wide wind speed
measurement range which can reach 0 ∼ 65 m/s, high resolution, when wind speed
is 0−5 m/s, the accuracy is ±0.1 m/s, when wind speed is greater than 5 m/s, the
accuracy is ±2 %v m/s, high measurement precision (0.1 m/s), etc.

4.1 Obtaining Test Data

In the process of testing, reference the cup verification regulation [14, 15] to chose
the wind test points for ultrasonic anemometer, which test data under the condition
of 2, 5, 10, 15, 20, 30 m/s. Because the shape of the structure characteristics of
Research on Testing the Ultrasonic Wind Sensors … 863

Table 1 The standard wind and the anemometer’s test wind when the angle is 10° m/s
Test point Standard wind Anemometer test wind
2 2.04 2.05 2.04 2.00 2.00 2.00
5 5.00 5.00 5.03 5.10 5.10 5.10
10 10.00 10.01 10.01 10.20 10.25 10.20
15 15.00 15.00 15.01 15.35 15.20 15.25
20 19.97 19.97 19.98 20.30 20.30 20.30
30 29.97 29.97 29.97 30.35 30.30 30.35

Table 2 Wind measurements test wind speed at different angles when the standard wind speed is
10 m/s V/m/s
Angle θ/° 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90
The wind speed 10.01 10.1 10.08 10.1 10.07 10.05 10.12 10.07 9.98

ultrasonic anemometer, the above test points are tested at intervals of 10° from 0° to
90° (Table 1).
Because of numerous test data, choose a different wind speed as the data rep-
resent when the anemometer and wind direction of 10° as well as data of different
angles when 10 m/s.
From Table 2, when the wind speed is close to the standard test wind speed,
there exists errors between the instruments measured wind speed and the standard
wind speed. In addition, there error is different in the same wind at different angles,
the error source is the probe and has the shadow effect [9] caused by.

4.2 Data and Error Analysis

Absolute error expression [16] is

δ x = x − x0 ð6Þ

In the formula, δx represents the absolute error (m/s); x represents the wind
measurement instrument of wind speed; x0 represents the standard wind speed.
According to (6), it can be calculated that the absolute error between the wind
anemometer’s speed value and the standard value is shown in Table 3.
The distribution chart of absolute error between the measured wind speed and
the standard speed under the same standard wind speed and different angles
(Fig. 3).
The absolute error is minimum when the standard wind speed is 5 m/s, the
absolute error of 10, 15, 20, 30 m/s increase gradually. The change of the absolute
864 M. Huang et al.

Table 3 The absolute error between the wind anemometer’s speed value and the standard value
V m/s
Wind speed Angle θ/°
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90
2 −0.04 −0.05 −0.14 −0.15 −0.27 0.06 −0.06 −0.25 −0.38
5 0.09 0.02 −0.10 0.15 0.17 0.09 0.11 0.01 0.00
10 0.20 0.17 −0.06 0.12 0.31 0.24 0.22 0.13 0.02
15 0.27 0.26 0.23 0.21 0.31 0.32 0.30 0.26 −0.09
20 0.33 0.33 0.40 0.39 0.45 0.49 0.42 0.27 0.22
30 0.36 0.99 1.25 1.26 1.20 0.82 0.81 0.45 0.16

Fig. 3 The distribution chart of absolute error

error is the largest and fastest when 30 m/s, and reaches a maximum. The distri-
bution map generally showed a trend of first increasing and then decreasing.
According to the measurement performance requirement of wind cup sensor [14,
15], the maximum permissible error is ±(0.5 + 0.03v) m/s.
The expression for the relative error [13] is
 
 δx 
E =   × 100 % ð7Þ
x0

In the formula, δx absolute error and x0 represents the standard wind speed. The
relative error between the instruments measured value and the standard wind speed,
as shown in Table 4.
Shown in the table, in the standard wind speed of 20, 15, 10 and 5 m/s relative
error value is smaller; Wind speed of 2, 30 m/s relative error is relatively large.
Research on Testing the Ultrasonic Wind Sensors … 865

Table 4 The relative error between the instrument measured value and the standard wind speed
Standard Angle θ/°
wind speed 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90
(m/s)
2 1.96 2.44 6.86 7.09 13.04 2.94 3.06 12.20 18.27
5 1.80 0.40 2.00 2.97 0.00 1.80 2.20 0.20 3.10
10 0.20 1.69 0.59 0.90 3.10 2.20 2.20 1.30 2.00
15 1.80 1.73 1.53 1.40 2.06 2.13 2.00 1.73 0.60
20 1.65 1.65 2.00 1.95 2.24 2.45 2.10 1.35 1.10
30 1.20 3.3 4.18 4.20 4.00 2.73 2.70 1.50 0.53

5 The Absolute Error Curve and Its Correction Equation

of Different Speed in All Direction

From Figs. 4 and 9, respectively, to draw the error curves and its correction
equation at different angles in different wind speeds. According to the influence of
the shadow effect [17] on different angles from 0 to 90°. So the error is corrected by
quadratic polynomial, the correction equation is shown in the figure. From the
figure, it can be found, the error rule is not too obvious when at 2, 5, 10 m/s, But
error rule gradually approaches the shadow effect change rule when the wind is at
15, 20, 30 m/s, that also verified the size of the wind speed impact the shadow effect
[17] (Figs. 5, 6, 7, 8).
The main factors that caused different errors at different angles is the shadow
effect, second, also include the stability and uniformity of the wind field, the
reflection interference of the ultrasonic in the tunnel wall, the wind energy loss in
the process of transmission, etc.

Fig. 4 The error

correction curve at 2 m/s
866 M. Huang et al.

Fig. 5 The error

correction curve at 5 m/s

Fig. 6 The error

correction curve at 10 m/s

Fig. 7 The error

correction curve at 15 m/s
Research on Testing the Ultrasonic Wind Sensors … 867

Fig. 8 The error

correction curve at 20 m/s

Fig. 9 The error correction

curve at 30 m/s

6 Conclusion

This study choose German Thies Clima ultrasonic anemometer as instrument to be

tested in the low-speed wind tunnel HDF-720. According to the verification reg-
ulation of wind speed sensor, set the test point and test in different angles.
According to the analysis of the actual testing process and data statistics, conclu-
sions are obtained as follows:
(1) Loop wind tunnel is used to analyze the ultrasonic anemometer verification
test method is feasible;
(2) Ultrasonic anemometer should make use of the program testing, not only
should be in accordance with the requirements for the wind sensor
868 M. Huang et al.

measurement procedures, select a specific set of test wind speed, and must,
according to the different aspects of ultrasonic sensor placement test data for
the corresponding correction
(3) The main factors that caused different errors at different angles is the shadow
effect, second, also include the stability and uniformity of the wind field, the
reflection interference of the ultrasonic in the tunnel wall, The wind energy
loss in the process of transmission, etc.
Based on the wind tunnel condition, the verification test study of the ultrasonic
sensor is carried out in the paper. Due to the limited test conditions and test object,
the above conclusion is hard to avoid has certain limitation, it is useful for further
improve and deepen to the follow-up study.

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