UK-based Dynamic Load Monitoring (DLM) has provided a wireless weighing solution for MHI Vestas Offshore Wind’s facility in Fawley.
DLM provided a 25-tonne capacity telemetry tensile link and a 20-tonne capacity S-cell load cell so that MHI Vestas could measure the weight of its 80 m-long turbine blades at both the root and the tip.
The load monitoring equipment is rigged beneath the hooks of the site’s overhead lifting gear. The data can be read on two separate wireless handheld displays.
DLM aims to raise its profile in the wind energy sector throughout 2021 and has developed a data-logging device that provides load, angle, and acceleration data at high sample rates particularly for use in offshore renewables.
Chris Scrutton, technical manager at DLM, said: “With many existing wind turbines installed already, we are finding clients are now looking for ways to improve reliability and efficiency, which often involves measuring of real time data in the field. Our data loggers have been used for measuring forces due to sea waves on array cables, and have been used in research and development projects in turbine fields. The next step in the development of instrumentation in offshore wind is remote access and data transfer.”
The North Sea is an area of constant interest, but Scrutton also pointed to the Americas as a likely hotbed of long-term activity, highlighting Texas, Iowa, Oklahoma, Kansas, and California.
