Generic composite flywheel designs

Abstract

Fiber reinforced composites belong to a new class of materials and allow great flexibility in flywheel design. The most efficient flywheel may no longer have the classic Stodola taper and indeed, may not even be round. Some of the flywheel designs that have been developed in the past are discussed. Although choice of material, mounts and service requirements often dictate the final design choice for a particular application, the composite flywheels in this paper are classified within a geometric framework, a simple stress analysis of a circular disk is carried out.