Investigating the quality inspection process of offshore wind turbine blades using B-spline surfaces

Wind turbines can only extract their rated amount of power if their blades conform closely to the Computer Aided Geometric Design (CAGD). This is quantified by reconstructing B-spline surfaces from measurement data taken from the blade. For reliable comparisons between the surface and CAGD, the generated surface must be an accurate representation of the part. To do this, the input parameters to the fitting process need to be optimised. Previously this has proved to be time consuming and computer intensive. This paper has focused on presenting a protocol for control point locations that increases the initial surface fitness; therefore, decreasing the time taken for an optimiser to converge on the ideal locations. The presented protocol was found to increase the fitness of a surface by up to 150%. For low tolerance products it has been observed that the protocol could remove the need for an optimiser all together.