BLOWING IN THE WIND: MACHINING OPPORTUNITIES

Wind power got its start in the U.S. back in the 1930s with the onset of wind turbine towers. Similar to what is seen today, those towers were 80 ft high with three large rotor blades that would turn with the wind. When the blades rotated, they activated a generator that turned the motion into storable electricity. Wind farms became popular in the U.S. in the 1970s when the demand for new and clean renewable energies started to increase.

With the influx of clean energy, there has been a large push towards wind power and other energy alternatives. Each wind turbine is constructed with over 8,000 components, many of which must be machined (see Figure 1). This creates significant opportunities for contract machine shops who are trying to penetrate the alternative energy market.

These opportunities, in turn, trickle down to OEMs who build machine tools geared towards machining wind turbine components, such as the Goratu Group (Elgoibar, Spain) that consists of Republic Lagun, Goratu, Zayer, Maquinaria Lagun, GMTK and Bermaq.

Starting in the late 1960s, the Goratu Group began supplying machines for various components of wind turbines to Europe?s major manufacturers. Some of the components of wind turbines that have been machined on Goratu Group machines are the nacelle frame, low and high-speed shafts, gearbox, yaw mechanism, rotor hub and the blades. Goratu, Spain?s premier builder of heavy duty CNC turning centers, has been supplying Geminis turning centers to turn the rotor shafts of the wind turbines.

The Goratu Group has supplied many Geminis lathes to not only turn the rotor shafts, but to provide complete machining of all features on the rotor shafts in two setups which including drilling, tapping, boring and milling. Goratu has also supplied dual carriage lathes to the wind turbine industry. On this machine, one carriage performs all the machining operations on the rotor shaft, while the other carriage does the finish grinding of the journal diameters on the rotor shaft.

GMTK, the Group?s vertical turning and grinding partner, processes the large gears, housings, bearing races and gearbox housing. GMTK vertical turning centers with turning, machining and grinding capabilities, provides a complete solution for processing the components in the nacelle.

The Lagun and Zayer brands have been supplying both bed type and moving column machining centers to machine various components of the nacelle, including the hub, the gearbox and even the nacelle itself. The hub?s function is to hold the blades and extenders of the wind turbine. The hub is attached to the nacelle through the shafts and has the ability to rotate freely.

The hub is manufactured out of iron and machined on Lagun and Zayer moving column machining centers. With the complex shape of the hub, both Lagun and Zayer employ their unique 45 deg articulating universal head to machine the hub without additional setups or complex fixtures. With the Lagun and Zayer vertical travel exceeding 120 in, these machine tools provide the reach and rigidity required for the most demanding machining requirements.

Since the Lagun and Zayer moving column design has such a large work envelop, the overall machining times have been dramatically reduced. This is largely due to the fact that the loading and unloading is internal to the machining cycle. With the growing demand for wind turbines, reduced machining time is essential for increasing productivity.

The curvatures of the wind turbine blades are machined on the Bermaq five-axis gantry machines. Bermaq is one of the leading pioneers in the five-axis technology and has the experience to help manufacture the composite wind turbine blades. Due to the materials the blades are manufactured from, the machining area is completely enclosed with the airborne particles being evacuated and collected to comply with environmental safety requirements.

The completely enclosed five-axis gantry milling machines combine the robustness of its structure with the agility of operation. All of the transmission guides are well protected against dust and chips. The blades are
fixed in place for machining with vacuum clamping.

In the U.S., the Republic Lagun Machine Tool Company (Harbor City, CA) was founded in 1968 and operates a 30,000 sq ft facility with 50 employees. Their manual and CNC milling machines, lathes and CNC machining centers have been supplied to the aerospace, U.S. government, defense, earthmoving, diesel engine, die and mold, shipbuilding and power generation industries. The company has a 70,000-installed machine base and stocks over $3,000,000 in parts and accessories.

Republic Lagun machine tools use heavily-ribbed construction for superior rigidity, strength, dimensional stability, and enhanced wear characteristics. The machines are modular in design, specifically developed to perform a full range of machining operations in a single setup, on a wide variety of materials, ranging from aluminum to steel, cast iron, and titanium. Virtually unlimited capacity is combined with the ability to manage large parts profitably, delivering the versatility and flexibility for large part machining, never before achieved.

For contract shops wanting to penetrate the alternative energy market, these machine tools are truly universal precision production centers geared for wind turbine manufacturing.

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Republic Lagun Machine Tool Co., 800 Sprucelake Drive, Harbor City, CA 90710, 800-421-2105, Fax: 310-830-0923 , www.lagun.com .