%0 Journal Article 
%A Machuca Macías, Marianela
%A Castilho Faria Mendes, Rafael
%A Felamingo Oliveira, Taygoara
%A Brasil Junior, Antonio C.P
%T On the upscaling approach to wind tunnel experiments of horizontal axis hydrokinetic turbines
%D 2020
%@ 1806-3691

%U http://hdl.handle.net/10498/38323
%X In this work, we proposed an upscaling methodology to extrapolate results from wind tunnel experiments with small-scale model to the full-size hydrokinetic turbine. Small-scale 1:20 wind tunnel experiments (
), with a three-blade horizontal axis turbine, were carried out looking to identify the characteristic curves of a full-size turbine operating in water (
). The lack of dynamic similarity due to unmatched Reynolds numbers is analyzed in the framework of blade element momentum theory arguments. A new semi-empirical power-law equation is achieved, uniquely based on the BEM theory which relates the power coefficients of model and full-size turbine to the Reynolds numbers and a power factor, specific to each turbine. Computational fluid dynamic CFD simulations for the same rotor geometry, simulating different runners with varying diameters from small-scale model to full-scale turbine are carried out to validate the upscaling arguments, and to verify the accuracy of the power coefficient curves predicted by proposed methodology.
%K Hydrokinetic turbines
%K Wind tunnel experiments
%K Upscaling
%K CFD simulations
%~ Universidad de Cádiz