How wind turbines are made
The biggest offshore turbines have blades up to 153 meters long and generate up to 26 megawatts.
- stations
- 6
- things upstream
- 69
- raw sources
- 25
- steps from the ground
- 9
The short version
A wind turbine is built from three main groups of parts. Blades are laid up from glass fiber composites, sometimes with carbon fiber, in huge molds. The tower is rolled and welded from steel. The nacelle on top holds a gearbox and generator, or a direct-drive generator with permanent magnets. Everything is trucked or shipped to site and lifted into place.
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Lay up the blades
Layers of glass fiber, sometimes with stiffer carbon fiber, are soaked in resin inside long molds and cured into hollow blade shells.
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Roll the tower sections
Steel plate is rolled into tubes and welded into tower sections. Average hub height of onshore turbines in the U.S. is 103 meters.
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Cast the hub and frame
The heavy hub that holds the blades, and the main frame, are cast from iron or steel.
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Build the generator
Copper windings, and in direct-drive designs permanent magnets using rare earths, are built into the generator. A geared design adds a gearbox that turns slow blade rotation into fast shaft rotation.
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Assemble the nacelle
Generator, gearbox, yaw drive and control electronics are bolted into the housing that sits atop the tower.
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Raise it on site
Cranes stack the tower, lift the nacelle and bolt on the rotor. The yaw system turns the whole head to face the wind.
Worth repeating
- Onshore turbines reach up to 15 MW, with blades up to 131 meters long.
- In 1908, 72 wind-driven electric generators from 5 kW to 25 kW operated in the United States.
- Gearless turbines are sometimes preferred because they eliminate a part that wears.
Back to the ground
Follow every input upstream and wind turbine starts as these 25 raw sources.
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Sources
Cite this page: "How wind turbines are made." Assembly Line, 2026-11-03. https://assemblyline.org/make/wind-turbine