On the Dynamic Virtualization of a 3D-Printed Scaled Wind Turbine Blade

Innovative production techniques, such as 3D printing of metals, require attention both in the production and in the post-production phase. In fact, such manufacturing processes introduce higher margins of uncertainty compared to more canonical processes. As a consequence, they require an increased effort to succeed in delivering representations for the so-called dynamic virtualization process. Virtualization encompasses the ensemble of activities that are aimed at formulating the virtual model of a given structure and subsequently validating and updating this model in order to guarantee a realistic and accurate response prediction in a broad range of operating conditions. This chapter explores the main challenges related to the mentioned limitations, in the context of a down-scaled industrially relevant case study: a 3D-printed scaled titanium Wind Turbine (WT) blade. The scaled blade has been the object of a complete virtualization process: from the design by means of conventional WT blade tests, up to its “Digital-Twin” establishment, where we exploit state-of-the-art Virtual Sensing (VS) techniques, due to their intrinsic capability of “enriching” the high-fidelity model’s predictions with information extracted from test data.