Leveraging the Advantages of Additive Manufacturing to Produce Advanced Hybrid Composite Structures for Marine Energy Systems

Abstract

Many marine energy systems designers and developers are beginning to implement composite materials into the load-bearing structures of their devices, but traditional mold-making costs for composite prototyping are disproportionately high and lead times can be long. Furthermore, established molding techniques for marine energy structures generally require many manufacturing steps, such as secondary bonding and tooling. This research explores the possibilities of additively manufactured internal composite molds and how they can be used to reduce costs and lead times through novel design features and processes for marine energy composite structures. In this approach, not only can the composite mold be additively manufactured but it can also serve as part of the final load-bearing structure. We developed a conceptual design and implemented it to produce a reduced-scale additive/composite tidal turbine blade section to fully demonstrate the manufacturing possibilities. The manufacturing was successful and identified several critical features that could expedite the tidal turbine blade manufacturing process, such as single-piece construction, an integrated shear web, and embedded root fasteners. The hands-on manufacturing also helped identify key areas for continued research to allow for efficient, durable, and low-cost additive/composite-manufactured structures for future marine energy systems.

Subcomponent Validation of Composite Joints for the Marine Energy Advanced Materials Project

“…The DEI specimens consisted of threaded cylindrical steel inserts that were adhesively bonded in-plane with the composite laminate direction. This is also a commonly used design for the root end of wind turbine blades to attach them to the hub (Bender, Hallett, and Lindgaard 2019;Murdy et al 2021). The specimen dimensions were based around the design of the root connections of the National Rotor Testbed 13-meter (m) blades (Figure 7) (Ennis and Paquette 2015).…”

Eklemeli imalat yöntemlerinde vakum infüzyon yolu ile üretim optimizasyonu

“…Murdy vd. çalışmasında bir deniz enerji sistemi uygulamasında reçine ve 3B yazıcılar kullanılarak türbin kanadı üretimine değinilmektedir [26]. Bu çalışmada 3B baskı ile elde edilen kalıplar zımparalandıktan sonra epoksi ile kaplanmış ve kompozit üretim sürecine hazırlanmıştır.…”

Additive Manufacturing for Powering the Blue Economy Applications: A Tidal Turbine Blade Case Study

“…One of the key areas of research in the MRE space is the development of efficient and cost-effective manufacturing processes for marine hydrokinetic (MHK) turbine blades. Additive manufacturing (AM), also known as 3D printing, has emerged as a particularly promising technology in this regard [2]. Aside from its capacity to produce complex geometries, AM also offers other significant advantages, such as reduced material waste, shortened production times, and enhanced design flexibility.…”