Investigation of Blade Modifications to Enhance Savonius Water Turbine Performance Through Vertical Pipe Flow

Abstract

Savonius is a turbine with a simple construction and good initial torque that has become a promising technology for generating electric power. However, the efficiency of the turbine still needs to be improved. Therefore, the proposed study was conducted to enhance the Savonius turbine's performance with additional s/r (straight profile) and l/r (blade end). Rainwater harvesting was used as an experiment with only gravitational potential energy. The resulting power output, coefficient of power, and rotational speeds were used to evaluate the turbine's performance. The additional s/r was used to direct the water before hitting the concave turbine, and the additional l/r was used to catch the energy stored in the water in a more optimum manner. Based on the results, an additional blade end (l/r) of 0.6 and a straight blade (s/r) of 0.75 produced the best performance with 0.29 Cp, 1023 rpm of rotational speeds, and a maximum power generated of 60.8 W.