The laser-assisted tape winding (LATW) is an automated process for manufacturing fiber-reinforced thermoplastic tubular products, such as pipes and pressure vessels. Multi-physical phenomena such as heat transfer, mechanical bonding, phase changes and solid mechanics take place during the process. These phenomena need to be understood and described well for an improved product reliability. Temperature is one of the important parameters in this process to control and optimize the product quality which can be employed in an intelligent model-based inline control system. The incoming tape can overlap with the already wounded layer during the process based on the lay-up configuration. In this situation, the incoming tape can step-on or step-off to an already deposited layer/laminate. During the overlapping, the part temperature changes due to the variation of the geometry caused by previously deposited layer, i.e. a bump geometry. In order to qualify the temperature behavior at the bump regions, an experimental set up is designed on a flat laminate. Artificial bumps/steps are formed on the laminate with various thicknesses and fiber orientations. As the laser head experiences the step-on and step-off, the IR (Infra-Red) camera and the embedded thermocouples measure the temperature on the surface and inside the laminate, respectively. During the step-on, a small drop in temperature is observed while in step-off a higher peak in temperature is observed. It can be concluded that the change in the temperature during overlapping is due to the change in laser incident angle made by the bump geometry. The effect of the step thickness on the temperature peak is quantified and found to be significant.

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Floating vertical-axis wind turbines for offshore wind energy present a concept with novelty and potentials for reducing COE. Cost reduction for offshore wind power plants is an industrial challenge, and DeepWind is - As the analysis of the current design shows-believed to be a good candidate in achieving this. In the paper the current design status of the 5 MW DeepWind concept is presented. The intended siting for the turbine is off the Norwegian west coast at about 250 m of sea depth. Focus is set on the integrated design highlighting structural benefits of the light rotor, the hydrodynamic aspects of the floating hull, and new generator design embracing magnetic bearings. Two important design tools were developed which allow the industry to analyze various VAWT(vertical Axis Wind Turbine) variants for offshore applications: a main design tool "HAWC2" for aeroelastic design of VAWTs, and a generator design tool "NESSI". HAWC2 has been adopted for VAWT rotors by DTU Wind Energy in the project and is explained on its technical capability to embrace integrated modeling of the different physical aspects. NESSI, developed at AAU (Aalborg University) is presented with focus on key elements in generator design. The paper presents new developments in the current design of a novel rotor shape with overspeed control. Rotor performance, design structural key figures and upscaling potential are reported. New results implemented on permanent magnets generator and - bearing technology show, that it is possible to achieve a competitive design ready for further industrial optimization. A preliminary analysis is provided on the emergency philosophy for this concept.@en