Wind Inspections

Jadewind

55%

Reduced inspection time

3+

Turbines per day

About

Founded in 1996 and headquartered in Varel in northern Germany, Jadewind GmbH & Co. KG is one of the first independent engineering consultancies for wind turbines in the German market. With more than 25 years of industry experience, Jadewind provides technical machine assessments, rotor blade evaluations, gearbox endoscopy, vibration measurements and lightning protection system testing for wind farm operators and asset owners. As the wind energy sector develops with increasing rotor sizes, longer turbine lifetimes and rising requirements for traceable condition assessments, Jadewind supports its customers with independent expert services that place strong emphasis on reliability and technical quality. By integrating the TOPseven autonomous drone inspection and contactless LPS continuity solution into its operations, Jadewind expanded its inspection capabilities, strengthened its service portfolio and enhanced the quality and clarity of its documentation for onshore turbines.

Industry

Wind Inspections

Company size

20 employees

Founded

1996

Share

“The system is very efficient and stands for innovative change—it keeps up with the times.”

Jolan Schröder

Surveyor

The Company

A global leader in packaged foods

Riverton Foods has grown from a regional supplier into a national brand with products on millions of shelves. The company prides itself on balancing scale with quality, investing in sustainable sourcing and innovative product lines to meet changing consumer demand.

With a vast vendor network and complex distribution channels, Riverton’s financial operations must run flawlessly to avoid disruptions. Every delay or error in vendor payments risks impacting production schedules and straining supplier relationships.

Challenges

High time requirements for large rotor blades: Rope access inspections on large models such as the V162 demanded significant time on the blade, often resulting in long on-site durations and limiting daily throughput.
Dependence on external rope access teams: Jadewind relied on external rope specialists for blade inspections, reducing flexibility, affecting scheduling, and increasing coordination efforts.
Manual documentation with limited structure: Reporting was based on photos and spreadsheets, making defect localization and cross-checking difficult for clients and internal quality assurance.
Physical demands and safety exposure: Rope-based inspections involved physically demanding work at height, presenting higher safety risk and operational fatigue for inspection personnel.
Limited ability to scale inspection capacity: The combination of long inspection times per turbine, external resource dependency, and manual reporting created barriers to scaling the service and offering competitive pricing for larger turbine fleets.

The TOPseven Solution

Autonomous visual blade inspection with standardized data capture:
TOPseven enabled Jadewind to perform a complete autonomous visual inspection of all blade surfaces with a consistent and repeatable flight pattern.
Contactless LPS (Lightning Protection System) continuity measurement:
TOPseven provided a non-contact LPS continuity check that could be conducted during the same stop as the visual inspection.
Integrated and structured digital reporting:
TOPseven supplied a reporting platform that consolidated inspection findings into a structured blade report with clear localization and whole-blade context.
Higher daily inspection output:
By combining autonomous visual inspection and LPS in one workflow, TOPseven improved operational efficiency on site.

Results in Detail

Speed and utilization

Reference V162 onshore. The autonomous visual inspection combined with LPS required 2.75 hours per turbine. Rope access for the same turbine size generally required 5 hours, resulting in a time reduction of 2.25 hours per turbine.
Personnel utilization improved when two operators carried out machine and drone tasks in parallel.

Documentation and defensibility

Blade-wide overviews and standardized reports improved finding localization and client perception versus rope-access reporting (tables + loose photos).

Economics and service model

Bringing inspections in-house reduced reliance on external rope freelancers and enabled more competitive pricing for clients choosing drone inspections, while maintaining quality.

People and safety

Drone operations are less physically demanding for inspectors than rope work.

Parallelization (one operates drone; one orients blades/handles machine tasks including LPS setup) streamlines fieldwork.

Internal acceptance increased as output quality and efficiency became visible.

Scope and limitations

Rope remains essential for hand-near examinations, interior checks, and cases where material haptics or standard-mandated close inspections are required. Jadewind alternates methods across cycles to balance efficiency and normative expectations.

“The documentation is much clearer. It is much easier for customers to understand where the damage is.”

Jolan Schröder

Surveyor

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59%

Inspection time saving

How Deutsche WindGuard saves up to 59% inspection time with TOPseven

59%

Inspection time saving

How Deutsche WindGuard saves up to 59% inspection time with TOPseven

59%

Inspection time saving