Testing of adhesive joints in the wind industry

Sub-component testing is applied to the bond-line of rotor blades to close the gap between the coupon level and full scale blade tests. Therefore, a numerical simulation of a blade is performed, a survey on adhesive joint testing is done, and a sub-component is designed. Static and cyclic asymmetric three point bending tests are performed on the sub-component. The results are used to investigate common design concepts for rotor blades and are compared with coupon results. The sub-component tests will improve the understanding of adhesive joint fatigue behaviour and offer an opportunity for new tests.