Flangeless support structures

Abstract

A flangeless assembly for connecting tubular sections of a tubular support structure. A flangeless finger plate assembly connects adjacent tubular sections of a tubular support strucure. The finger plate assembly includes an outer finger plate, an inner finger plate, and corresponding ends of the adjacent tubular section butted at a point. Throughhole arrays are provided on each finger plate such that one throughhole array connects to a matching throughhole array on the corresponding end of the adjacent tubular section. Fastening means are provided to connect the inner and outer finger plates to the adjacent tubular sections according to the throughhole array.

Description

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

The invention relates generally to tubular structures and more specifically to flangeless connections between sections of tubular support structures.

Tubular support structures have many and varied types of application. Some types of support structures exist where equipment is supported at elevated heights from the ground. These support structures may be tall and carry operating equipment of various weights at the top, thereby subjecting joints in these structures to high stress. The support structures may be used in many applications, including cellular phone towers, radar towers, and wind towers.

Wind turbine support towers are large structures, sometimes extending to significant heights to accommodate large wind turbine rotor blades and to strategically place the rotor blades within a wind path. For example, a typical tower may have a height of about 80 m.

FIG. 1 illustrates an exemplary tubular structure fabricated with tubular sections of welded segment assemblies with flanges welded on the ends of the tubular sections. The tubular structure 10 may be built up from tubular sections 15, with flanges 27 and 29 on opposite ends that are bolted together to develop the structure height. The tubular sections 15 include tubular segments 20 of annular shape, also called “cans”. Weld grooves are provided on either the inner or the outer end surfaces of the tubular segments 20. The tubular segments 20 are welded to each other in can/can welds 40 to form segment assemblies 25. The segment assembly 25 then has a top closure flange 27 and a bottom closure flange 29 welded to the ends of the segment assembly, using a submerged arc welding process, a high heat input process. The top closure flanges 27 and the bottom closure flanges 29 are also annular in shape. The top closure flange 27 and the bottom closure flange 29 of adjacent sections 15 are then bolted together along a bolt line 30 to assemble the sections together. A base flange 33 at the bottom of the tubular structure 10 and a platform flange 35 at the top of the tubular structure 10 complete the vertical layout of the structure.

The tubular structure 10 of FIG. 1 may represent a typical wind tower for supporting a wind turbine or other various kinds of support towers. For this exemplary tower of about 80 m in height, the tower includes three sections, two sections being about 25 m long and one section being about 30 m long. The length and number of individual sections in other representative tubular structures may vary according to the application and height of the structure. The tower may be either cylindrical or conical.

For example, a tower height of 50 meters may be employed for high wind conditions and 110 meters for low wind conditions. The horizontal cross section of the exemplary tower is generally circular and may be tapered at upper levels. Tapering may be achieved by use of individual tubular segments, the tubular segments tapered as right conical sections along an axial direction. However, the horizontal cross section for the tubular segments of other representative structures may be of different geometries.

FIG. 2 illustrates a cross-sectional view of a properly aligned flange connection for sections of a tubular structure. The flange/can weld 37 connects the top closure flange 27 with the segment assembly 25 located beneath it. The flange/can weld 39 connects the associated bottom closure flange 29 with the welded segment assembly 25 located above it. Ideally, the flange mating surface 41 of the top closure flange 27 and the flange mating surface 43 of bottom closure flange 29 should be completely parallel for the throughhole 45 intended for bolt 47 and nuts 49 to be perfectly aligned with both flanges.

On-going problems with the exemplary wind turbine support tower include weld cracking, flange distortion and bolt failure during tower flexure, each contributing to the life cycle cost of the tower. Moreover, the heat generated during the flange welding process distorts the flanges.

FIG. 3 illustrates a process for bolting with a distorted flange. Initially, due to the heat applied at the flange to can weld joint, the flange 29 is distorted in A. When a welded top flange 27 and a welded bottom flange 29 are brought together, the bolt lines of the throughholes 45 are misaligned in B and the tubular sections 15 (FIG. 1) are thus capped by distorted flanges. Bolts 47, used to join adjacent flanged modules 15, may be torqued until the deformed flanges are brought into alignment in C. These bolts 47 with nuts 49 may be torqued to a pre-stress level, for example about 590 Mpa, allowing the deformed flanges to be brought into alignment. This operation develops high prestress in both the welds 37 and 39 and the bolt 47, reducing the capacity to sustain service-induced loads. Such high and non-uniform prestresses in the bolts may lead to bolt failures and weld failures in D. Similar problems may also be encountered in other types of tubular support structures with similar welded flanged joints.

Welds, by nature, have inherent stress concentration features. When tubular structures, such as towers are subjected to high wind loads, the tower experiences flexural stresses. Superimposed on theses are high cycle vibration flexural stresses driven by the mass at the top of the tower. This combination of factors, in addition to the pre-stressing of assembly, places high tensile stresses on the welds and bolts leading to a high probability of weld cracking or bolt failure with the associated high maintenance costs. Bolt failure has become such a significant issue that suppliers have to machine the flange after welding to meet the flatness requirement Some tower requesters, for example, may require the supplier to measure flange flatness using a laser measurement, with anything in excess of 1.5 mm deviation from planar requiring further machining. A supplier may have to cut and re-weld flanges to meet this requirement. This may have a major impact on cost and schedule, as well as tower strength.

An additional area of concern is the flange weld inspection. It is difficult to get an accurate assessment of weld integrity since prevailing inspection techniques rely on a calibrated, non-direct, detection procedure.

Accordingly, there is a need to provide an assembly for wind turbine support tower modular sections that do not result in high stress in the connecting joints and which allow the stresses to be checked.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to in general to a joint for joining sections of a tubular structure together, and in particular to a flangeless joint for joining sections of a wind turbine support tower.

Briefly, one aspect of the invention provides a finger plate assembly for connecting two adjacent tubular sections of a tubular support structure. The finger plate assembly includes an outer finger plate; an inner finger and corresponding ends of the adjacent tubular sections butted at a point. Throughhole arrays are provided on each finger plate, where each throughhole array provides connection to one of the two adjacent tubular sections. A matching throughhole array is located on the corresponding ends of the adjacent tubular sections. Means for fastening the inner and outer finger plate to the tubular sections is provided.

Briefly, in accordance with another aspect of the present invention, a flangeless joint is provided for connecting two sections of a tubular support structure. The flangeless joint includes two adjacent sections of the tubular support structure and a plurality of finger plate assemblies uniformly distributed around the periphery of the two adjacent sections of the tubular support structure.

Briefly, in accordance with a third aspect of the present invention, a tubular support structure is provided. The tubular support structure includes a plurality of tubular sections and a plurality of flangeless joints employing finger plate assemblies for connecting adjacent tubular sections, the finger plate assemblies being uniformly distributed around the periphery of the adjacent tubular sections.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING

These and other features, aspects, and advantages of the present invention will become better understood when the following detailed description is read with reference to the accompanying drawings in which like characters represent like parts throughout the drawings, wherein:

FIG. 1 illustrates an exemplary tubular structure with flanged sections that are bolted together.

FIG. 2 illustrates a cross-sectional view of a properly aligned flange connection for modular sections of a tower;

FIG. 3 illustrates a process for bolting with a distorted flange;

FIG. 4 illustrates a side sectional view of an finger plate assembly;

FIG. 5 illustrates an isometric view of a typical finger plate;

FIG. 6 illustrates the relative stiffness of a finger plate assembly joint and a current short flange joint in response to tower sidesway;

FIG. 7 illustrates the flangeless joint utilizing finger plate assemblies uniformly distributed around the periphery of a tubular support structure;

FIG. 8 illustrates an axial cross section of a wind turbine support tower including flangeless joints connected with finger plate assemblies.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

The following embodiments of the present invention have many advantages, including avoidance of high tensile stresses on welds and bolts leading to a probability of weld cracking or bolt failure and the associated high maintenance costs.

One aspect of the present invention provides finger plate assemblies to join adjacent sections of a tubular assembly. FIG. 4 illustrates a side sectional view of a finger plate assembly 50 that overcomes the previously described problem, in tubular assemblies with welded flanged joints, of flange distortion after welding. The annular rings of two adjacent flangeless modular sections 52 and 54 of the tubular assembly (without flanges) are brought together in close proximity at point 56. An inner finger plate 57 is provided on an interior of the tubular assembly. The inner finger plate 57 may be provided with a curved outer diameter matched to the curved inner diameter of the flangeless modular sections 52 and 54. The inner finger plate 57 is provided for connecting the inner surfaces 58 and 60 of the adjacent flangeless sections. An outer finger plate 62 is provided on an exterior of the tubular assembly. The outer finger plate 62 may be provided with a curved inner diameter matched to the curved outer diameter of the modular sections 52 and 54. The outer finger plate 62 is provided for connecting the outer surfaces 64 and 66 of the adjacent flangeless modular sections. Fastening throughhole arrays are provided on each finger plate and are matched with the fastening throughhole array provided on the corresponding adjacent ends of the flangeless modular sections. The assembly further may further include bolts 47 and nuts 49 according to the throughhole array. However, other suitable fastening means may be utilized depending upon the particular application.

FIG. 5 illustrates an isometric view of a typical finger plate utilizing nut and bolt fastening. The typical finger plate 70 has an inner surface 72 and an outer surface 74. For an inner finger plate, its outer surface is matched to the curved outer surface of the adjacent tubular sections. For an outer finger plate, its outer surface matched to corresponding surface of adjacent tubular sections. A typical bolt throughhole array 76 is shown for connection with one tubular section and typical bolt throughhole array 78 is shown for connection with the adjacent tubular section. Finger plate design is according to standard design practice including spacing of bolt throughholes from the edge of the finger plate, spacing between adjacent bolt throughholes, thickness of the finger plate, surface dimension of the finger plate and plate material selection.

For the exemplary 80 m tower, the finger plate may have an arc dimension of about 2 m, a height of about 1 m, and a thickness of about 30-40 mm. The material for finger plates may preferably include ASTM A 572 Gr 50 steel plate. Bolt throughhole arrays 76 and 78 on the finger plates may be preferably configured in double rows applied to each adjacent section of tower for a total of about 48 bolt holes per finger plate. Diameter for the bolt throughholes may preferably be sized about 1.25 inch. Minimum spacing between the bolt throughholes may be about 5 inches. Typical bolts for the finger plates in the 80 m tower may preferably be M36 10.9 grade bolts that are torqued to a bolt prestress of about 510 Mpa (74 ksi).

In addition to eliminating the end flanges, the discrete nature accommodates slight aberrations in tower section geometry to speed up assembly and minimize expensive re-work. The finger plate assemblies are designed with sufficient thickness, length and width to provide acceptable local and overall stiffness to address tower side-sway and stability requirements. Standard bolt design practice will determine finger plate dimensions.

FIG. 6 illustrates the relative stiffness of a finger plate assembly joint and a current short flange joint in response to tower sidesway. Long curved finger plate assembly joint 80 of inner finger plate 57 and outer finger plate 62 provide increased joint stiffness for resisting bending due to tower sidesway. The finger plate assembly joint 80 distributes the bending moments over a longer curved surface L1 as compared to a short surface L2 of top closure flange 27 and bottom closure flange 29 available to absorb the sideway moment in the conventional flanged joint 85.

A typical flangeless joint with finger plate assemblies according to one aspect of the present invention uniformly distributes a plurality of finger plates around the periphery of adjacent sections of the tubular support structure.

FIG. 7 illustrates a flangeless joint 90 with finger plate assemblies 92 uniformly distributed around the periphery of a lower tubular section 96. The inner finger plates 93 and outer finger plates 94 and the lower tubular section 96 are shown for clarity. An upper tubular structure and fasteners are omitted for the sake of clarity. The tubular structure may be a support tower or a wind turbine support tower. For an exemplary wind turbine support tower of about 80 m, five finger plate assemblies may be distributed around the periphery of the adjacent sections of the wind turbine support tower. Further bolting may be employed as a fastening means for the wind turbine support tower. While a simplified scheme for bolting throughholes is shown, FIG. 5 illustrates a finger plate with a more typical throughhole array for the exemplary wind turbine support tower.

The curved nature of the finger plates contributes to joint stiffness. Appropriate design of the finger plate length, thickness, and width will stiffen the joint locally and provide prescribed over-all tower stiffness for side sway, stability, and tower-head eccentric loading in a much more structurally efficient manner compared to flanged joints of prior art. The thickness and spacing of the finger plates will also be a function of the prevailing standard practice for bolted joint design. The bolt hole diameter and spacing will be a function of service conditions.

The use of finger plate assemblies replaces welding flanges to the can assemblies as the means of joining modular sections of the tower. Consequently, the distortion and prestressing problems associated with these welds and the bolts is eliminated. Further, it is difficult to get an accurate assessment of weld integrity since prevailing inspection techniques rely on a calibrated, non-direct, detection procedure. Replacing the welds with bolts allows an inspector to check each bolt for allowable pre-load using a torque wrench.

According to yet another aspect of the present invention, a tubular structure is provided that includes a plurality of tubular sections and a plurality of flangeless joints employing finger plate assemblies for connecting the adjacent tubular sections. The finger plate assemblies are uniformly distributed around the periphery of the adjacent tubular sections. The tubular structure may define a support tower and more specifically a wind turbine support tower that utilizes the finger plate assemblies for joining modular sections of the tower. The modular sections of the tower are assembled by welding tubular segments to form tower sections.

FIG. 8 illustrates an axial cross section of a wind turbine support tower 105. The wind turbine support tower 105 incorporates flangeless joints 90 utilizing finger plate assemblies 120 for connecting tower sections 96. The wind turbine support tower 105 provides support for wind turbine generator 110 and wind turbine rotor 115. The exemplary wind turbine support tower 105 is about 80 m in height, incorporating three tower sections 96 and two flangeless joints 90.

In this exemplary wind turbine support tower, five finger plate assemblies may be uniformly distributed around the periphery of the flangeless joint. The tower sections may be cylindrical shaped or have a generally truncated right conical section to provide for overall reduction in cross section of tower sections at higher elevations. Further individual tubular segments may be individually tapered along the axial length to provide for the progressive reduction in cross section for each individual tower section along the axial length of the tower section.

While only certain features of the invention have been illustrated and described herein, many modifications and changes will occur to those skilled in the art. It is, therefore, to be understood that the appended claims are intended to cover all such modifications and changes as fall within the true spirit of the invention.

Claims

1. A finger plate assembly for connecting two adjacent tubular sections of a tubular support structure, the finger plate assembly comprising:

an outer finger plate;

an inner finger plate;

corresponding ends of the adjacent tubular sections butted at a point;

throughhole arrays on each finger plate, wherein each throughhole array provides connection to one of the two adjacent tubular sections;

a matching throughhole array located on the corresponding ends of the adjacent tubular sections; and

means to fasten the inner and outer finger plates to the adjacent tubular sections.

2. The finger plate assembly as claimed in claim 1, wherein horizontal cross-section of tubular sections are circular-shaped.

3. The finger plate assembly as claimed in claim 2, wherein:

the outer finger plate comprises a plate curved inner diameter matched to a curvature of an outer surface of the tubular sections; and

the inner finger plate comprises a plate with a curved outer diameter matched to a curvature of an inner surface of the tubular sections.

4. The finger plate assembly as claimed in claim 3, wherein the tubular sections comprise sections of a support tower.

5. The finger plate assembly as claimed in claim 3, wherein the tubular sections comprise sections of a wind turbine support tower.

6. The finger plate assembly as claimed in claim 1, wherein bolts and nuts comprise the means for fastening according to the throughhole array.

7. The finger plate assembly as claimed in claim 1, wherein the throughhole array is symmetric with respect to the adjacent tubular sections of the tubular support structure.

8. The finger plate assembly as claimed in claim 1, wherein the throughhole arrays on the inner finger plate, the outer finger plate, and the adjacent ends of the tubular sections are machined prior to assembly of finger plate assembly.

9. A flangeless joint for connecting two sections of a tubular support structure, the flangeless joint comprising:

two adjacent sections of the tubular support structure;

a plurality of finger plate assemblies uniformly distributed around the periphery of the two adjacent sections of the tubular support structure.

10. The flangeless joint for connecting two sections of a tubular support structure as claimed in claim 9, wherein the two adjacent sections of the tubular support structure comprise sections of a support tower.

11. The flangeless joint for connecting two sections of a tubular support structure as claimed in claim 10, wherein cross-sections of the adjacent sections of the tubular support structure are circular-shaped.

12. The flangeless joint for connecting two sections of a tubular support structure as claimed in claim 11, wherein the two adjacent sections of the tubular support structure comprise sections of a wind turbine support tower.

13. The flangeless joint for connecting two sections of a tubular support structure as claimed in claim 12 wherein five finger plate assemblies are uniformly distributed around the periphery of the adjacent sections of the wind turbine support tower.

14. The flangeless joint for connecting two sections of a tubular support structure as claimed in claim 13, wherein the uniformly distributed finger plate assemblies employ bolting as a fastening means.

15. A tubular support structure comprising:

a plurality of tubular sections; and

a plurality of flangeless joints employing finger plates assemblies for connecting adjacent tubular sections, the finger plate assemblies being uniformly distributed around the periphery of the adjacent tubular sections.

16. The tubular support structure as claimed in claim 15, wherein the tubular support structure comprises a support tower.

17. The tubular support structure as claimed in claim 16, wherein the support tower comprises a wind turbine support tower.

18. The tubular support structure as claimed in claim 17, wherein the flangeless joints further comprise five finger plate assemblies uniformly distributed around the periphery of adjacent tubular sections.

19. The tubular support structure as claimed in claim 18, wherein the wind turbine support tower further comprises:

a base supporting the tower;

tower sections joined by the flangeless joints;

a platform connected to the top of the modular sections; and

a wind turbine and wind turbine rotor supported on the platform section.

20. The tubular support structure as claimed in claim 18, wherein the tower sections further comprise modular sections of welded tubular segments.