WT_Perf being removed from distribution

Hi,

I regret to inform the community that due to some known bugs in WT_Perf, overall lack of confidence in it, and insufficient resources to devote to it, we are pulling WT_Perf from distribution and support. We are currently working on a new version of AeroDyn that will use a modularized version of the BEM routines in CCBlade. We hope that some day we can incorporate the resulting module into the WT_Perf user interface, but we don’t know if we will ever get funding to do that. It certainly will not happen this fiscal year, which ends in September. Until and if WT_Perf is rereleased, we will no longer be able to answer questions about it.

Although I have never used CCBlade and know little about what it has to offer, you may consider using it instead of WT_Perf. You can find it here: [url]National Wind Technology Center's Information Portal | Wind Research | NREL. If you have questions about CCBlade, please post them here or contact the author (Andrew Ning) through email.

The is especially hard for me, as I’ve been working on WT_Perf since 1996. Of all the program I’ve worked on at the lab, it was my favorite.

Marshall

hello,

Sad news for WT_Perf, I admit to having some sentimental attachments to this program as well. But with the development of CCBlade the future of blade-element-momentum theory is looking bright ;-)

I uploaded the most recent known version of WT_Perf to GitHub. I uploaded WT_Perf source code within the HARP_Opt repository, since HARP_Opt also depends on WT_Perf. You can find the code and related archive here: [url]https://github.com/NREL/HARP_Opt/tree/master/Source/WT_Perf/v3.05.00a-adp[/url] I hope this is okay posting the WT_Perf code here; please let me know. It is still a useful code and hopefully this is convenient place to find WT_Perf whenever the need arises. I occasionally need to re-compile WT_Perf on different Linux machines, so having the source code on hand is helpful.

All the best,
Danny

Danny Sale
University of Washington
PhD student - Mechanical Engineering
Northwest National Marine Renewable Energy Center
depts.washington.edu/nnmrec/

This is an old post, but I have sent the link to several people who have asked about the status of WT_Perf since we removed it from the web site.

As an alternative to CCBlade, we have now released a driver program for AeroDyn v15. It doesn’t completely replace WT_Perf, but does provide much of its functionality: nwtc.nrel.gov/AeroDyn

I’m truly saddened to hear about WT_Perf, It was also my favourite BEM code :cry: Despite the bugs, It was an essential tool for my research and it helped me to learn everything I now know about fundamental aerodynamics of HAWT. It will be truly missed.