Increasing Number of NBIGages

Wind & Water Computer-Aided Engineering Software Tools
1

Dear FAST-Development Community,

I would like to increase the number of NBIGages for every blade and there outputparameters

SpnXXTAxb1/2/3
SpnXXTAyb1/2/3
SpnXXTAzb1/2/3

SpnXXTDxb1/2/3
SpnXXTDyb1/2/3
SpnXXTDzb1/2/3

SpnXXRDxb1/2/3
SpnXXRDyb1/2/3
SpnXXRDzb1/2/3

SpnXXFLxb1/2/3
SpnXXFLyb1/2/3

SpnXXMLxb1/2/3
SpnXXMLyb1/2/3

Having the ability to get results for more than 9 points along the blade would ease e.g. getting a deflection line for long blades. No more multiple runs with the same settings but different NBIGages would be necessary.
Since I am a totally newbie to FORTRAN and all source code for FAST I am wondering if anyone already did increase the numbers of NBIGages and outputparameters ?
Which files contain source code concerning NBIGages and outputparameters and need to be especially taken care of ?
Does anyone have expirience in running into problems like “stack-overflow” or struggeling with FORTRAN contraints like I suggest “limited namelength for parameters”?
Bonnie already did increase the number from 5 to 9 NBIGages and would like to continue increasing this number, but unfortunately she mentioned some issues with constraints. Am I right about this point and does a solution exists?
Any help on these questions would be great and if I get an increased number of NBIGages to work I would like to share any enhanced source code :smiley:

Best Regards
Tim Gerloff

MSc. Student
TU BERLIN

2

Dear Tim,

We made the limit 9 for a couple reasons. First, this allowed us to use the same naming convention as other local load and motion outputs (e.g., output parameter SpnJFLxbK is the local shear force at gage “J” of blade “K” along the local xb-axis). If more than 9 gages were available for output, two digits would be needed for the gage number. We try to limit all output names to no more than 9 characters to ensure that the total name is no more than 10-characters long (one can always add a “-” or “m” in front of an output name to get -1 times the value), which is the same number of digits used to output the numerical value of the output. Second, we felt that 9 gages was enough to accurately characterize the load or motion distribution along the blade. If you need values at other stations, you should be able to reasonably interpolate between the 9 available output stations.

If you feel 9 is not enough for your needs, you’ll have to modify the source code. To do this, search for where NBlGages is used in the source code and note where this is used in conjuction with hard limits of 9.

I hope that helps.

Best regards,