Pelton Turbine

The Pelton turbine was invented by carpenter Lester Allan Pelton in 1879 while he was working in California, and to this day it is still the turbine with the best efficiency profile. This type of turbine it’s ideal for big heads and small flow rates.

The potential energy of water at high altitudes reaches, via penstock, the turbine nozzle, where this energy became pressure one. One or more nozzles generate a powerful jet direct to the buckets of the runner, determining its rotation. Thanks to its special shape, the nozzle transform in kinetic energy all of the pressure one upstream to it.

The buckets are shaped like two spoons side-by-side: it splits the jet in 2 half. This balance the axial thrust on the 2 sides of the turbine.

The jet of water leaving the nozzle is deflected by almost 180 degrees by the buckets on the turbine, which are pushed round as a result of this deflection.

Another very valuable feature of this type of turbine is the very wide flow regulating range: the flow rate of the jet can be reduced (thus lowering the power level) without negatively impacting on the efficiency level of energy transformation.

The section of the jet is adjusted using a “Doble needle”, which move on the same axis of the jet, blocks a part or all the jet. That type of regulation cannot be too fast (is necessary to avoid undesirable water hammers on the penstock), for this reason there is another useful part used on rapid emergency stop: the deflector. It has the function to divert the jet away from the working trajectory, so as not to provide energy to the runner, to then proceed to closing the nozzle in the time defined by the allowable overpressure in the penstock.

Our Pelton turbines can be installed on pressure heads of between 50 and 1000 meters, and could be with horizontal (1 and 2 jets) and vertical (4 jets) axis.