• Journal of the Korean Society of Industry Convergence
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.421-431
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• 2023

Recently, the destructive power of typhoons is continuously increasing due to the influence of global warming. In a situation where the installation of floating wind turbines is increasing around the world, concerns about the huge loss and collapse of floating offshore wind turbines due to strong typhoons are deepening. Regarding to the safe operation of the floating offshore wind turbine, the development of a new type of disconnectable mooring system is required. A new fairlead chain stopper considered in this study is devised to more easily attach or detach the floating offshore wind turbine with mooring lines comparing to other disconnectable mooring apparatuses. In order to investigate the structural safety of the initial design of fairlead chain stopper that can be applied to MW-class floating type offshore wind turbine, scale-down structural models were produced using a 3-D printer and structural tests were performed on the models. For the structural tests of the scale-down models, tensile specimens of acrylonitrile butadiene styrene material that was used in the 3-D printing were prepared, and the material properties were evaluated by performing the tensile tests. The finite element analysis of fairlead chain stopper was performed by applying the material properties obtained from the tensile tests and the same load and boundary conditions as in the scale-down model structural tests. Through the finite element analysis, the structural weak parts on the fairlead chain stopper were reviewed. The structural model tests were performed considering the main load conditions of fairlead chain stopper, and the test results were compared to the finite element analysis. Through the results of this study, it was possible to experimentally verify the structural safety of the initial design of fairlead chain stopper. It is also judged that the study results can be usefully used to improve the structural strength of fairlead chain stopper in a detailed design stage.