Kaplan turbine

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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. 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.^[2]

Kaplan turbines are now widely used throughout the world in high-flow, low-head power production.