Blade condition monitoring

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Standalone wind turbine blade CMS to reduce the cost of failures, repairs and downtime.

Whatever damages your WTG blades have, we have the condition monitoring system (CMS) to improve your decision making and reduce the cost of your repairs and turbine downtime. The value case for CMS for wind turbine gearboxes, generators and main bearings has been well established through temperature and vibration. All require a crane to change out so why are there no good blade CMS solutions. Both rope access repair and blade replacement are expensive so the value case for CMS is just as compelling. 

Blade CMS has historically been expensive as strain gauging, installation or OEM takes a long time and requires collaboration with the wind turbine manufacturer. This is not an issue for our on-tower CMS technology which is standalone and installed using magnets and it’s power and communication is wireless. 

What blade failure modes can we detect?

Lightning Strike Damage
Lateral Cracks
Leading Edge Erosion
Icing
on tower WTG blade CMS

Our on-tower blade CMS listens to the blade as it passes the tower and can detect damage acoustically from any damage to the outer 66% of the blade produced by lightning strikes, blade furniture damage or leading edge erosion. An in-built coil detects when the tower has been struck by lightning. This information can be used in force majeure claims, investigating electrical faults and is easier than climbing a tower to retrieve the lightning cards. 

Monitor lightning strikes remotely

Record the time of lightning strikes to support insurance claims and understand whether your blades have been damaged. Keep an eye on blade health in between drone inspections. 

Holistic Blade CMS Hardware

Depending on the failure modes you are experiencing (or expecting to see!) we have a CMS solution for you.  

On-Blade System: Measure ice build up, relative pitch misalignment

On-Tower System: Measure leading edge erosion, lightning strike damage, time of strikes and blade furniture damage on the outer 66% of the blade

In-Blade System: Measure lateral and longitudinal cracks in the root zone (33% of the blade closest to the hub) 

Track blade damage progression remotely

  • Improve blade decision making
  • Reduce the cost of blade repairs
  • Check on the impact of lightning strikes remotely

Detect Icing on the surface of the blade

Record ice build up on blades to the nearest mm using our on-blade system. Perform automatic remote resets of your WTG optimised for revenue, safety and loads. Reduce icing downtime and monitor ice levels during idle and standstill. Narrow the window of icing downtime customised to your wind farms ice throw risk profile

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