Wind Turbine Welding: The Ultimate FAQ Guide

Wind turbine welding is the most important process during wind tower production.

There are offshore wind towers and onshore wind towers. According to your wind tower size, the annual output of the wind tower, and your factory land space, SENLISWELD could provide a full solution for you.

This FAQ guide will help you to choose and understand more about wind turbine welding.

What is Wind Turbine Welding?

Welding in the wind turbine industry can be a difficult process. The wind turbines that help the turbines need incredibly heavy-duty machinery to maneuver and fabricate.

SENLISWELD  produces full SAW (Submerged Arc Welding) solutions for each can’s radial and longitudinal welding. We specialize in solo, twin, or multiple wire weld heads with multiple electric power integration.

We also have full-service rising lines with fit-up facilities and turning rolls.

welding manipulator + conventional rotator

How Wind Turbine Welding Works?

While the wind energy sector in the United States seems to be constantly evolving, one of its constant targets is to reduce costs by installing turbines in windier locations, which implies offshore and higher up.

To leverage on the powerful and more steady winds in both areas, tower producers are searching for a solution to decrease the increased expenses connected with designing and building in this difficult setting.

Offshore wind turbines, for example, are often bigger than onshore equivalents and must withstand fatigue loads correlated with higher wind levels and larger engines, as well as erosion and colder weather.

Machines that build modern wind turbines and structures rely heavily on both traditional and advanced production processes, such as welding.

A welding-machine maker recently sought assistance from a linear motion and assembly-technology firm in order to develop custom welding equipment for the wind industry. Welding machinery of this kind is used to manufacture turbine towers up to 100 meters tall.

What is the Mechanism Behind Wind Turbine Welding?

Usually, a mechanism rolls a metal disk, typically 709 grade 50 carbon steel, into a container known as a “can” that reaches around 9 feet long by 8 to 15 feet dia.

Another equipment then welds along lateral seams to finish the container and then circumferentially to connect them with multi-pass rear welds created by submerged arc welding.

wind tower view onshore

For the outside welding, the weld head is hung from a cantilevered guide rail. The weld head travels small strides in two and three directions, all around and across a line, whilst the rest of the system stays fixed.

The movement of the weld head is regulated by a conventional control actuator at the edge of a horizontal arm. Smaller parts of the container are welded on a wide production line known as a rising line.

Wind turbine welding procedures and supplies can differ depending on the tower’s length, design, and position.

What are the Overseas Wind Turbine Welding Specifications?

Once the pieces have been assembled and internal tower infrastructure, For instance, ladders, has been added, they are shipped to the project location, raised into position, and fixed together.

Overseas tower welding specifications are determined by the tower’s broad-scale and related nacelles, as well as the stronger steel needed for durability and damage tolerance.

Joining thicker steel parts and wider weld joints necessitate the use of a greater number of welding consumables, resulting in further welding passes. This increases the job’s time and expense.

What is the Function of Wind Turbine Welding?

Concocting towers that can survive harsh environmental factors necessitate a sturdier plate, higher-strength material, or both, as well as higher-strength weld layers.

Welding such materials necessitate welding processes as well as a filler material with a chemical structure that has similar mechanical characteristics as the weld material. Using consumables built for overseas towers eliminates welding concerns such as cracking.

Submerged arc-welding flux and electrodes have been designed to provide the power and influence properties required for onshore and offshore towers, as well as the more strict specifications of lower-temperature towers.

two vessels connection

What is the Monitoring Process of Wind Turbine Welding?

A modern welder is said to allow operators the opportunity to monitor any part of the welding performance in order to produce quality results for a particular application.

Because of maximum stability over the welding waveform, operators will weld at considerably higher deposition speeds than with equivalent traditional energy sources, enhancing weld efficiency and lowering prices.

Furthermore, several energy sources can be used to weld with numerous arcs, increasing deposition speeds and growing the number of attempts required to fill the joint.

This lowers construction time and supplies, which tends to minimize total wind turbine welding project expenditure.

wind turbine production line in the workshop

Which Three Things You Need to Know About Wind Turbine Manufacturing?

• The Need

To maneuver and concoct specific cans and tower parts, the wind turbine industry needs very wide and heavy-duty machinery. Since wire deposition and pace are critical when welding tower parts together, SENLISWELD provides single, paired, or multiple wire weld heads.

If the tower’s length expands, the supporting infrastructure must be resilient to a broad variety of component shapes and dimensions. When building wind turbines, expanding lines of properly fit stations and spinning rolls are needed.

Operators are usually placed at the back of the boom to physically map the parts. This can be difficult for the user and it can also be inefficient.

• The Solution

SENLISWELD provides full automation systems for SAW fabrication of heavy parts used in wind turbine welding, from the spinning rolls and rising lines to the manipulator and flux distribution device.

Since our manipulators have column and boom movement capacities of up to 8 m (26.25 ft), the most radius can be welded. To execute the seam welds on each can, the linear motion of the boom can be upgraded to pinpoint motion.

To create complete expanding lines, SENLISWELD gives properly fit stations and a complete line of spinning rolls, like electric transverse motion. Since our fit-up stations are flexible, they can handle any can size and any tower segment.

SENLISWELD includes laser seam detection and image sensors to guarantee that the joint is monitored and welded properly the first time.

This also helps the operator to operate and track the machine from a remote position, which reduces operator exhaustion and increases efficiency.

• The Outcome

AMET has full SAW systems for wind turbine welding. We design and construct the whole device in-house, from the fit-up stations to the control system.

With more than 20 years of experience, we will have a strong return on investment by delivering a dependable and well-supported infrastructure for years of continuous service.

Our systems have been tried and tested. We also built many networks that are actively constructing wind turbines in the United States and Europe.

Our professional customer support staff is one of our most valuable assets. We can include timely, friendly, and polite support to ensure that downtime is held to a lower limit.

What is the Background of Wind Turbine Production Lines?

Have you ever wondered where and how green energy progressed from small agricultural windmills to wind turbines dominating countryside landscapes in country fields to floating underwater wind turbines?

The usage of wind as a sustainable energy source has a fascinating background. The first operating mill in the United Kingdom was built in 1665 at Outwood Mill in Surrey.

It is the oldest continuously operating windmill in the United Kingdom, and it uses wind energy to manually ground grains and generate flour.

There were four styles of windmills in operation during this time period. Sunk post mills, open trestle windmills, smock mills, and tower mills are all examples of windmills.

The majority were either used for grain grinding or as a water pump to manually provide water to animals.

wind turbine onshore view

It wasn’t until 1877 that an electrician, Prof. James Blyth of the former Anderson’s College of Glasgow, now Strathclyde University, designed the globe’s first wind turbine to generate power in Scotland. Prof. Blyth’s wind turbine reached a bit more than 33 feet tall.

The wind turbine was the electronic energy source that utilized Gearmotor power to illuminate his Marykirk vacation house.

Surplus electricity was routed to accumulators, but it was also provided to the town to provide street lighting. Locals resisted for superstitious purposes, claiming that electricity was the “practice of the devil.”

Which Key Points Need to Remember About Wind Turbine Production Line?

This wind turbine production line, also known as a wind turbine welding line, is specifically built for submerged-arc welding of the wind energy generator tower pole’s outer circular seam.

It uses a cantilever frame that can combine multiple single cantilever systems to form a welding workspace capable of multi-pass welding. Its welding performance can be significantly improved in this manner.

column & boom + welding rotator

This wind turbine production line consists primarily of twisting (rolling) machines, CNC cutting machines, welding machinery, a welding rotator collection, and sandblasting and painting turning rolls.

1. Since the single-stage wind turbine tube is cylinder-shaped with average diameters in the upper and lower sections, users must strictly monitor the loading of the main steel plate.

2. The flange-to-tower tube weld deformation should be tightly regulated.

3. Since each section of the tower is long, close consideration should be given to the fitting and welding of the ringneck of the shaft. While the precision of the straightness is guaranteed, the matching reliability can be significantly enhanced.

What are the Main Components of Wind Turbine Production Line?

• CNC Cutting Machine

There are two types of CNC cutters to pick from CNC flame cutter and CNC plasma cutter, and both can cut multiple plates at the same time, making the cutter extremely effective.

• Bending Machine

A bending machine is a medium for shape. Its aim is to put together a bend on a work material. A bend is produced by using a bending instrument during a horizontal or revolving movement.

• Welding Equipment

Welding equipment consists primarily of a welding manipulator, a submerged-arc welding device, an automated recycle feeding system, and a welding rotator.

The wind turbine tube’s corresponding component and oval seam welding portion are primarily composed of a welding manipulator, a submerged arc welding device, an automated recycle feeding system, and a welding rotator.

• Sandblasting and Painting

Spinning rolls with walking capability are installed to aid in the sandblasting and painting of the tower tubing process.

The painting spinning rolls have center-concave roller wheels that can be utilized to hold flanges, enabling painting work to be done easily. The engine is sand-proof and anti-explosive.

Why it is a New Age of Wind Turbine Production?

Analysis and research have demonstrated that wind turbines and turbines are efficient sources of power by translating kinetic energy from the wind into propeller mechanical energy over the years as awareness has developed and demand for renewable energy sources has risen.

The rotary energy is then transformed into electricity by a generator.

According to the study, the method has an optimum performance rating of 59.26 percent (known as the Betz Limit), with existing wind turbines designed to turn wind power into available power at a rate of 35 to 45 percent.

Wind turbines today are much bigger than those of previous decades, capable of generating Megawatts per turbine and supporting towns rather than a series of street lights.

wind tower welding  production line

The standard size of European wind turbines in Europe is 3 MW, with rotor blades 50 to 100 feet long, capable of running up to 1,500 homes per turbine. Bigger wind turbines of 7.5 MW (the highest to date) have blades that are 60 meters long.

The highest onshore British wind turbine stands at 125 meters in height.

Increased appetite for green energy is a big driving factor behind large-scale wind plant development in Europe and across the planet. Wind power is thus far the most effective in terms of production and operating costs of all sources of renewable energy.

In Europe alone, 4,149 wind turbines from 94 wind farms in 11 countries are linked to the grid, producing 15,780 MW. These figures are expected to rise as the Paris Agreement establishes an aggressive goal of 32% renewable energy generation by 2030.

Wind turbines are becoming taller as winds travel quicker at higher altitudes, allowing towers to absorb some of the kinetic energy.

What are the Fabrication Conditions for Wind Turbine Manufacturing?

Manufacturers understand the value of going high for industrial-scale clean energy from wind turbines. Not the kind that can support a single house, but a wind turbine that can run a house in a single rotation.

This necessitates a stable production method that can be scaled. For onshore or offshore wind turbines such as the giant 8.4 MW turbine.  It is necessary to use powerful machinery.

how welding manipulator works on wind tower production

Strong steels are used in smaller quantities of steel tubes (known as cans) typically measuring 9ft long and 8-15ft in diameter to produce such towering manufacturing magnificence.

These are assembled in warehouses through a production/growing line that necessitates traditional and advanced wind turbine welding at different points.

What Role Does Welding Automation Equipment Play in the Procedure?

Wind turbine manufacturing lines use a number of machinery for automation in order to reduce costs while improving weld and manufacturing efficiency. There are different styles of machinery used in an increasing line for the wind power business.

Metal plates of different thicknesses may be molded into steel cans using a can roller. A weld rotator will then be used to transform the can mechanically, while another system applies an additional radial weld to secure it.

Operators regulate the rotating speed and inspect the weld quality. Wind turbine manufacturers will improve efficiency and output while reducing overheads by automating the welding procedures for both radial and longitudinal welds.

Once the cans have been packed, positioners and turntables will be used as part of the assembly line for different weld operations before being manually transferred to a fit-up frame, where each can be installed and shipped to the destination location.

How We Blend Into Wind Turbine Manufacturing Operations?

Welding rotators spin wide cans, enabling welders to operate in any field and at any angle of every tubular portion. They will weld both longitudinal and radial seams.

Rear -welds may be performed in several passes with limited operator effort using automatic submerged arc welding systems. Welding the cans’ exterior surfaces is achieved using a weld-head hanging from a column and boom, streamlining all outer welding operations.

Heavier steels are utilized in all aspects of the manufacturing process as the size of wind turbines increases. The denser the steel, the more demanding the welding method is on the technician, sometimes resulting in fatigue.

The architecture of wind turbines is cutting-edge and sustainable. All internal and external operations can be automated.

SENLISWELD provides wind turbine producers with the equipment they need to optimize their operations, improve proficiency and productivity of all welding levels, and reduce operator fatigue.

Furthermore, it helps operators to retain their commitment to detail during the process, resulting in reliably high-quality welds.

Heavy-duty welding rotator in the workshop

What are the Technical Elements of Chinese Wind Turbine Materials?

Wind turbine steels are reduced alloy, super strength framework steels. China’s reduced alloy super-strength steel manufacturing technology is established. As a result, Q345 steel is not the only steel grade available for wind turbine construction.

Aside from Q345 steel, there are other reduced alloy super-strength steel types that are ideal for the manufacture of wind turbine towers. Wind farm owners may pick the most cost-effective wind turbine components for their own.

wind turbine welding production workshop

Metal mechanical property research is strictly governed by Chinese GB requirements. The standard test sample for steel plates with thicknesses greater than 12mm is 10mm 10mm 55mm; for steel plates with thicknesses less than 12mm, the standard test sample is 10mm 7.5mm 55mm.

Each research category has three lab tests, and the mean value is used to determine the test results.

If anyone’s test value goes below 70% of the norm, the test personnel must take another three tests from the same steel bar and take the average of the six variables.

What are the Analogous Steel Grades in Foreign Steel Regulations?

Below there is a related metal grades comparison chart with various steel levels for international wind farm owners who may not be acquainted with Chinese steel grades. The comparison table will assist you in choosing the right steel content for your wind turbine welding.

steel grades

What are the Types of Various Wind Turbine Manufacturing?

The commercial wind turbine tower production industries are dominated by wrought iron wind turbine towers. To help the wind turbines, the bulk of commercial wind power projects utilize wrought iron wind turbine towers.

Since wind turbine towers can exceed hundreds of meters in height, steel wind turbine towers are usually made up of multiple steel cylinders with bolts on both ends, and the whole wind turbine production line is mounted on-site.

Some people assume that the strength of steel dictates the wind turbine durability output in order to preserve the stability of the wind turbine tower during harsh temperatures and long-term corrosion.

Each expects that their wind turbine can last as long as possible. Therefore, the wind turbine component should be able to withstand both stress and buckling in harsh environments.

the welding process of wind tower

• Concrete Wind Turbine Tower

The wind turbine pole consisting of concrete and steel bars is known as a concrete wind turbine tower. Concrete wind turbine towers, apparently, have wide margins for wind turbine fatigue efficiency.

It is the world’s largest wind turbine tower form, and there are no density constraints on concrete wind turbine towers. By augmenting the diameter of the concrete wind turbine tower, we can extend its service life to a total of 50 years.

Concrete wind turbine towers need a significantly longer construction time than steel wind turbine towers, which raises the upfront expense. Second, since scraping, concrete wind turbine towers are unrecyclable.

It would pollute the atmosphere and necessitate considerably additional funds for the refuse collection fee. Third, concrete turbine towers can only be used by onshore windmills. Concrete wind turbine towers cannot be installed in the ocean.

• Lattice Wind Turbine Tower

Lattice wind turbine towers are wind turbine towers consisting of small dimension steel pipes that have been welded to a latticed frame to ensure stiffness.

Lattice wind turbine towers are more widely used to assist small wind turbines, such as those used in suburban wind power generation projects in North America.

As opposed to other forms of wind turbine towers, lattice wind turbine towers have advantages such as lightweight, low expense, visual clarity, and so on. It has a lock on the demand for tiny wind power generation systems.

However, for commercial windmills with high-power wind turbines and wind turbine towers that are often thousands of meters tall, lattice wind turbine towers are not rigid enough to accommodate the industrial wind turbines for an extended period of time.

Wind turbine towers must not only withstand the movement of the wind turbines but also be sturdy enough to withstand the relentless effect of the currents in overseas wind power generation systems.

• Welded Steel Wind Turbine Tower

The commercial wind turbine tower production industries are dominated by welded steel wind turbine towers. To help the wind turbines, the bulk of commercial wind power projects utilize welded steel wind turbine towers.

Since wind turbine towers can exceed hundreds of meters in height, steel wind turbine towers are usually made up of multiple steel cylinders with clamps on both ends, and the whole wind turbine tower is mounted on the project site.

how welding rotator and welding manipulator work

Some people assume that the strength of steel dictates the wind turbine tower fatigue output in order to preserve the stability of the wind turbine tower during harsh temperatures and long-term corrosion.

Each expects that their wind turbine tower can last as long as possible. Therefore, the wind turbine tower dimension should be able to withstand both stress and stiffening in harsh environments.

As the diameter of the sheet metal increases, so does the steel stress power. However, the steel buckling strength decreases. According to wind turbine tower reports, improvements in welding and flange measurements have a detrimental effect on steel strength.

The fatigue strength of wind turbine towers is defined by welding efficiency and wind turbine tower design nature, rather than steel consistency.

As a result, there is no need to waste more resources on using high-priced steel to build the wind turbine tower. Normally, high-strength steels including ASTM A646M, A529M G.50, DIN S355J2G3, and Q345E would suffice.