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Kaplan turbine
 | This article needs additional citations for verification. (June 2010) |
The Kaplan turbine is a propeller-type water turbine which has adjustable blades. It was developed in 1913 by Austrian professor Viktor Kaplan,[1] who combined automatically adjusted propeller blades with automatically adjusted wicket gates to achieve efficiency over a wide range of flow and water level.
The Kaplan turbine was an evolution of the Francis turbine. Its invention allowed efficient power production in low-head applications which was not possible with Francis turbines.[2] The head ranges from 10 to 70 metres (33 to 230 ft) and the output ranges from 5 to 200 MW. Runner diameters are between 2 and 11 metres (6 ft 7 in and 36 ft 1 in). Turbines rotate at a constant rate, which varies from facility to facility. That rate ranges from as low as 54.5 rpm (Albeni Falls Dam) to 450 rpm.[3]
Kaplan turbines are now widely used throughout the world in high-flow, low-head power production.
- ^ "New Austrian Stamps". The Sun. No. 1765. Sydney. 24 January 1937. p. 13. Retrieved 10 March 2017 – via National Library of Australia., ...Victor Kaplan, inventor of the Kaplan turbine....
- ^ Smil, Vaclav (2004). Creating the twentieth century: technical innovations of 1867-1914 and their lasting impact. Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 90. ISBN 0-19-516874-7.
During the 1880s Lester Allen [Allan] Pelton...developed and patented an impulse turbine,...a design for very high water heads. In contrast, in 1913 Viktor Kaplan patented a reaction turbine with adjustable vertical-flow propellers that has become a preferred choice for low dams.
- ^ Hydropower project Tocoma (PDF). IMPSA (Report).
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