EXPERIMENTAL PERFORMANCE OF A MODIFIED SAVONIUS TURBINE FOR SMALL SCALE PORTABLE WIND POWER GENERATION

Small scale portable wind turbine has the main criteria such as simple, easy to make, strong, and it can be operated at ground level at low wind speed. This modified Savonius rotor is chosen because it meets the criteria. This study was performed to know the performance of the modified Savonius wind turbine such as the tip speed ratio, power and the efficiency. The aspect ratio, overlap ratio, blade arch angle and the blade shape factor used were 1.5, 0.0, 110° and 0.5 respectively. The overall size of the turbine was 1.2 m in diameter, 1.8 m in height. The transmission utilized used a pulley with a ratio of 1:5. The results indicate that the cut in speed obtained in this study is 2.5 m/s, and the maximum power attained is 24.5 watt at the wind speed of 6.06 m/s. Meanwhile, the maximum efficiency found is 11.6%. An additional data such as an occurrence of the prevailing wind speed observed is also provided to see the wind characteristics.