Running Bladed

Overview

Once Bladed 4 has been installed and access to the licence has been set up, it is recommended that you follow the steps below to help verify that the Bladed 4 GUI can be used to open projects, run simulations, and view results as expected.

If any error messages or unexpected screens are shown (that are not mentioned below), please contact us with details of the issue (e.g. screenshots, steps to reproduce the issue, etc.).

Starting the Bladed 4 GUI

Open the Bladed 4 GUI using the Bladed application shortcut on the Desktop or in the Start menu.

If the GUI opens successfully - without any error messages being shown - it is likely that your Bladed 4 installation and licence configuration is correct. Continue to the Running simulations section below.

Some of the common error messages and issues which may occur at this point are:

• The “Security device not found” error message is displayed (for Bladed 4.15 and earlier):
  
  
  
  
• The “Bladed license was not found” error message is displayed (for Bladed 4.16 and later):
  
  
  
  
• The text size of the menu bar in the main window appears to be too large:
  
  
  
  
• The “Could not find Batch framework” error message is displayed:
  
  
  
  

If any of these error messages or issues occur, please see the Troubleshooting section below for further advice.

Running simulations

1. Open the demo_a project file (demo_a.prj), which can be found in the DemoModels/Demo_a subfolder, in the Bladed application folder:
   
   
   
   
   
   
2. In the Calculations window, select the Steady Power Curve calculation, and click the Run Now button.
   
   
   
   
3. Select a location on your machine to save the calculation output (e.g. the results subfolder within the Bladed application folder, although any folder can be used). The default run name can be left unchanged. Click the OK button.
   
   
   
   
4. If the Starting Calculation dialog is shown, click the Start button.
   
   
   
   
5. The calculation will start running. If all has worked correctly, the Calculation Progress window will appear as follows when the calculation has completed:
   
   
   
   
6. Click Close to close the Calculation Progress window.
   
   

Viewing results

1. To view some graphical results, click the Data View button in the main window toolbar.
   
   
   
   
2. Click the Channel 1 button on the Graph Parameters window.
   
   
   
   
3. Select Steady power curve in the Data Group panel, and select a variable in the Variables panel (e.g. Electrical power). Click the OK button.
   
   
   
   
4. Repeat steps 2 and 3 above to select further outputs to display in some of the other channels. The Graph Parameters window should look similar to this (note that some of the units have been changed from their default values):
   
   
   
   
5. Click the View Graph button. The graph window should look similar to this:
   
   
   
   

MATLAB runtime

Certain Bladed 4 screens depend on the MATLAB runtime, which is installed when running the Bladed 4 installer. To verify that the runtime has been installed correctly, please try opening the Blades and Tower screens, using the steps below:

1. Click the Blades button in the main window toolbar.
   
   
   
   
2. The Blade Properties window should appear like this:
   
   
   
   
3. If the window displays correctly, and no error messages are shown, click the Cancel button. If an error message is shown, view troubleshooting advice.
   
   
4. Click the Tower button in the main window toolbar.
   
   
   
   
5. The Tower window should appear like this:
   
   
   
   
6. Click the Display Structure... button - the Turbine View window should appear like this:
   
   
   
   
7. If the window displays correctly, and no error messages are shown, close the Turbine View window, and click the Cancel button on the Tower window. If an error message is shown, view troubleshooting advice.
   

If you have reached the end of these steps without encountering any issues, it is likely that Bladed 4 has been installed successfully on your machine. You will soon be ready to start using Bladed 4.

Troubleshooting

“Security device not found” or "Bladed license not found" error message

If an error message is displayed stating that the Bladed security device or licence was not found, this indicates that Bladed 4 cannot find a valid licence on the machine.

• If using a licence on a dongle plugged into the local machine:
  • Check that the instructions in the Licence Setup tab have been followed.
• If using a licence hosted on a remote machine (i.e. a network licence):
  • Click the Configure Network License button on the error message dialog box (or navigate to http://localhost:1947/_int_/config_to.html) to open the licence manager Configuration page.
  • Check that the instructions in the Licence setup tab have been followed.

Please contact us for further assistance if:

• A browser error message is shown when trying to load the licence manager website.
• The list of licence features does not appear on the licence manager Features page: http://localhost:1947/_int_/features.html

Menu text size is too large

The Windows display scaling setting may need to be adjusted if the text size of the menu bar in the main Bladed 4 GUI window appears to be too large.

To try to resolve the issue:

• Close the Bladed 4 GUI
• Right-click on the Windows desktop and click Display settings
• Change the text size setting to 100%
  
  
  
  
• Restart Bladed 4

If this does not resolve the issue, view further suggested workarounds for resolving font and display issues (download the "Font Fix.reg" file referenced in the document).

“Could not find Batch framework” error message

If an error message is displayed stating that the Batch Framework could not be found, try running the Bladed 4 installer again to reinstall Bladed 4.

If the same error message still occurs, please contact us for further assistance.

MATLAB errors

If an error message similar to "Failed to call GHView.dll" is displayed, this indicates that there is a problem with the MATLAB runtime (which certain screens and functionality depend on). To try to resolve this error, please see the Troubleshooting page, which lists various suggested actions that you can try. If none of these suggestions resolve the issue, please contact us.

Need help?

For further assistance please contact us.