HOUSING STIFFNESS INFLUENCE ON GEARBOX DYNAMIC LOADING FOR WIND TURBINE APPLICATIONS

The design of wind turbine gearboxes must consider particular conditions such as wind speed variations, load changes, and they must be as light as possible. Although there are enough field data, their life prediction lacks. of good estimation. It is common to find gearboxes with bearing or gear premature failures. The housing can dissipate noise and vibrations in a positive manner; but in wind turbines it can increase the synchronization among nonlinear elements. This phenomenon adds an additional dynamic load on the gears and rolling bearings. The work presented here is a method for estimating the influence of the housing stiffness on the dynamic synchronization of wind turbine gearbox elements. The analysis estimates a dynamic load factor that affects both gears and rolling bearings. The analysis takes into account the gearbox nonlinear elements, as well as the turbine blades excitations.