Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU), NSF NHERI 2025: Investigating Alternative Pressure Tap Design for Photovoltaic (PV) Panel Wind Tunnel Testing

Wind tunnel testing of photovoltaic (PV) panels is often constrained by the limited number of pressure taps, restricting the size and number of panels that can be instrumented. These limitations may hinder the testing of larger, more representative PV systems. To address this challenge, this project developed and evaluated an alternative through-hole pressure tap design that directly measures net pressures without separate top and bottom surface instrumentation. The uniqueness of this design lies in its simplicity and resource efficiency. Data from wind tunnel testing at the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) Natural Hazards Engineering Research Infrastructure (NHERI) Wall of Wind (WoW) Experimental Facility can be reused by researchers to further analyze this tap design under different conditions or to develop other configurations that address the goal of reducing the number of taps needed to measure net pressure. The primary audience includes wind engineering researchers, PV panel designers, and others in experimental aerodynamics who are seeking more efficient instrumentation methods.