Numerical and experimental investigation of an axial compressor flow with tandem cascade

Basing on a prototype of DCA airfoil and axial displacement overlap of 10% chord,seven kinds of tangential displacements are taken to simulate the flow conditions in tandem cascade with numerical methods to select a better geometry with higher performance.The configuration with tangential displacement b/t=0.83 would gain better flow performance than the others.On this basis,two configurations with tangential displacement b/t=0.67 and 0.83 among several configurations are chosen to take into experimental investigations by using TR-PIV system to capture the flow velocity instantaneously.The configuration with b/t=0.83 is observed a better flow field performance than b/t=0.67.Its injection flow in the gap zone is much stronger,wake zone area of the front and rear blade is smaller and the stream flow is more improved.It shows that the flow performance in experimental investigation is quite in the same trend as the numerical results predict.     

Application of high-turning bowed compressor stator to redesign of highly loaded fan stage

A redesign of a highly loaded fan stage by using high-turning bowed compressor stator was conducted. The original tandem stator was replaced by the highly loaded bowed stator which was applicable to highly subsonic flow conditions. 3D contouring technique and local modification of blade were applied to the design of the bowed blade in order to improve the aerodynamic performance and the matching of the rotor and stator blade rows. Performance curves at different rotating speeds and performances at different operating points for both the original fan stage and redesigned fan stage were obtained by numerical simulations. The results show that the highly loaded bowed stator can be used not only to improve the structure and the aerodynamic performances at various operating points of the compressor stage but also to provide high performances at off-design conditions. It is believed that the highly loaded bowed stator can advance the design of high-performance compressor. __________ Translated from Journal of Propulsion Technology, 2007, 28(1): 26–31 [译自: 推进技术]     

Design and optimization of a single stage centrifugal compressor for a solar dish-Brayton system

According to the requirements of a solar dish-Brayton system,a centrifugal compressor stage with a minimum total pressure ratio of 5,an adiabatic efficiency above 75% and a surge margin more than 12% needs to be designed.A single stage,which consists of impeller,radial vaned diffuser,90° crossover and two rows of axial stators,was chosen to satisfy this system.To achieve the stage performance,an impeller with a 6:1 total pressure ratio and an adiabatic efficiency of 90% was designed and its preliminary geometry came from an in-house one-dimensional program.Radial vaned diffuser was applied downstream of the impeller.Two rows of axial stators after 90° crossover were added to guide the flow into axial direction.Since jet-wake flow,shockwave and boundary layer separation coexisted in the impeller-diffuser region,optimization on the radius ratio of radial diffuser vane inlet to impeller exit,diffuser vane inlet blade angle and number of diffuser vanes was carried out at design point.Finally,an optimized centrifugal compressor stage fulfilled the high expectations and presented proper performance.Numerical simulation showed that at design point the stage adiabatic efficiency was 79.93% and the total pressure ratio was 5.6.The surge margin was 15%.The performance map including 80%,90% and 100% design speed was also presented.     

Effects of axial non-uniform tip clearances on aerodynamic performance of a transonic axial compressor

This paper presents a numerical investigation of effects of axial non-uniform tip clearances on the aerodynamic performance of a transonic axial compressor rotor （NASA Rotor 37）. The three-dimensional steady flow field within the rotor passage was simulated with the datum tip clearance of 0.356 mm at the design wheel speed of 17188.7 rpm. The simulation results are well consistent with the measurement results, which verified the numeri- cal method. Then the three-dimensional steady flow field within the rotor passage was simulated respectively with different axial non-uniform tip clearances. The calculation results showed that optimal axial non-uniform tip clearances could improve the compressor performance, while the efficiency and the pressure ratio of the com- pressor were increased. The flow mechanism is that the axial non-uniform tip clearance can weaken the tip leak- age vortex, blow down low-energy fluids in boundary layers and reduce both flow blockage and tip loss.     

Effects of suction side squealer tip on the performance of a low-speed axial compressor

This paper presents the investigation of the effects of suction side squealer tip on the performance of an axial compressor.The experiment is carried out in a single-stage large-scale low-speed compressor.The investigated tip geometries include flat tip as the baseline and suction side squealer tip.The tip clearance of the baseline is 0.5% of the blade span.The static pressure rise characteristic curves of both the rotor and the stage are measured.The flow field at the exit of the rotor is measured by a 5-hole probe under design and off-design conditions.The static pressure on the endwall of the rotor passage is also obtained.The results show that the pressure rise characteristic curves obtained by measuring the pressure on the end wall are almost unchanged by using the suction side squealer tip.The measuring results of the 5-hole probe show the static pressure and the total pressure in tip region is slightly greater than that of the flat tip at the design condition at the exit of the rotor.It also leads to greater av-eraged static pressure rise and total pressure.At the near stall condition,the averaged static pressure and total pressure is lower than the baseline which is related to the redistribution of the blade load caused by the suction side squealer tip.     

给定轴分速时轴流压气机级性能的解析优化

用一维理论对轴流压气机的初步设计作进一步的研究,导出了轴流压气机基元级的特性关系,建立了在给定轴向分速时最优化设计的数学模型,得到了解析关系,所得结论具有很好的普适性,并可进一步拓广用于多级轴流压气机优化中。     

Investigation of endwall flow behavior with plasma flow control on a highly loaded compressor cascade

To discover the flow behavior in the endwall region and mechanism of plasma flow control on a highly loaded compressor cascade, distributions of static pressure coefficient, total pressure loss coefficient and streamline pattern were investigated. Results show that cross flow from the pressure surface to neighboring suction surface exists under pitch-wise pressure gradient. The deflected endwall boundary layer flow interacts with the incoming flow, and then both of them leave off the endwall in the form of a span-wise vortex. Effect of angle of attack on static pressure is greater than that of free stream velocity. The distinct variations of total pressure loss with endwall actuations are mainly located within the outer verge of a triangular area with high total pressure loss. Effect of pitch-wise actuation on separated flows is much better than that of stream-wise actuation, and both enhance with the increase of angle of attack and actuation strength. An efficient method for plasma flow control in the endwall region is the increase of actuation strength, such as adjusting discharge voltage or changing plasma power supply.     

Rotating stall and stall-controlled performance of a single stage subsonic axial compressor

Activities by various authors on aerodynamics and control dynamics of rotating stall in axial compressor are first traced. Then, a process of stall cell evolution in a subsonic stage is discussed based on a 2-D CFD. A few numbers of vortices grow ahead of the rotor accumulating vorticity ejected from lightly stalled blades, and eventually organize a cell of circumferentially aligned huge vortices, which merge and recess repeatedly during the rotation. Such stall disturbance is intensified on trailing side of a circumferential inlet distortion and decays on the leading side. Considering these features, a new algorithm for stall warning is developed based on a correlation between pressure waveforms at each passing of a fixed blade. A remarkable change in the correlation level at near-stall provides a warning signal prior to the stall onset with sufficiently large time margin. This scheme is applied to achieve rotating stall prevention by actuating flaps installed on the hub. The last issue is on characteristics of forward swept blade which has much increased throttle margin with decreased tip loss. A 3-D computation shows that a secondary vortex generated in suction surface mid span interacts to reduce the tip leakage vortex that initiates the stall.     

Prediction of hub corner stall characteristics of a highly loaded low speed single stage fan

In this paper a numerical investigation has been presented on the stall mechanism of a highly loaded Single Stage Low Speed Fan designed for the research test facility to be installed at North Western Polytechnic University (NWPU) Xi’an, China. The results presented are for the design point, near stall and just stall operating conditions at design speed. Design point studies have been found to be an indicative of stall area. Unsteady method of domain scaling has been used to compute the results at near stall and just stall conditions. It has been found that unlike the conventional tip leakage flow of the rotor, stator hub section is mainly responsible for the stall of the fan. The flow mechanism has been discussed with correlation to the design variables and previous investigations. Commercial CFD code NUMECA FINE/Turbo has been used for computations; results have been compared with results obtained from commercial CFD code ANSYS-CFX. The loss prediction of latter code is conservative than the former. The stall mechanism predicted by both codes is analogous.     

Numerical study of effect of compressor swirling flow on combustor design in a MTE

An effect of the swirling flow on the combustion performance is studied by the computational fluid dynamics(CFD) in a micro-gas turbine with a centrifugal compressor, dump diffuser and forward-flow combustor. The distributions of air mass and the Temperature Pattern Factor(as: Overall Temperature Distribution Factor-OTDF) in outlet are investigated with two different swirling angles of compressed air as 0° and 15° in three combustors. The results show that the influences of swirling flow on the air distribution and OTDF cannot be neglected. Compared with no-swirling flow, the air through outer liner is more, and the air through the inner liner is less, and the pressure loss is bigger under the swirling condition in the same combustor. The Temperature Pattern Factor changes under the different swirling conditions.     

Numerical investigation of effect of inlet swirl and total-pressure distortion on performance and stability of an axial transonic compressor

This paper represents numerical simulation of flow inside an axial transonic compressor subject to inlet flow distortion, to evaluate its effect on compressor performance and stability. Two types of inlet distortion, namely inlet swirl and total pressure distortion are investigated. To study the effect of combined distortion patterns, different combinations of inlet swirl and total pressure distortion are also studied. Results for cases with total pressure distortion indicate that hub radial distortion improves stability range of the compressor while tip radial distortion deteriorates it. An explanation for this observation is presented based on redistribution of flow parameters caused by distortion and the way it interacts with stall inception mechanisms in a transonic axial compressor. Results also show that while co-swirl patterns slightly improve stability range of the compressor, counter-swirl patterns diminish it. Study of combined distortion cases reveals that superimposition of effects of each individual pattern could predict the effect of a combined pattern on compressor’s performance within an accuracy of 1%. However, it is unable to predict the associated effect on compressor’s stability.     

Effects of probe support on the stall characteristics of a low-speed axial compressor

In order to investigate the effects of probe support on the stall characteristics of micro compressors, an experiment was carried out on a large-scale low-speed research compressor according to the principle of geometric similarity. A cylindrical probe support intruding to 50% blade span was mounted at 50% chord upstream from the rotor blade leading edge. The static pressure rise characteristic of the compressor is measured, with and without the probe support respectively. The dynamic compressor behavior from pre-stall to full stall was also measured. The results indicate that the stability margin of the compressor is lowered after installing the probe support. The stall inception is aroused by modal wave disturbances. The disturbances developed into two stall cells smoothly before installing the probe support, while the disturbances first developed into a single stall cell then splitting into two stall cells after installing the probe support. The presence of probe support lowers the initial intensity of the rotating stall of the compressor, while it doesn't alter the intensity of the rotation stall after the compressor enters into full stall.     

Study on the effects of end-bend cantilevered stator in a 2-stage axial compressor

Leading edge recambering is applied to the cantilevered stator vanes in a 2-stage compressor in this paper. Different curving effects are produced when the end-bend stator vanes are stacked in different ways. Stacking on the leading edge induces a positive curving effect near the casing. When it is stacked on the centre of gravity, a negative curving effect takes place. The numerical investigation shows that the flow field is redistributed when the end-bend stators with leading edge stacking are applied. The variations in the stage matching for the mainstream and near the hub have an impact on the performance of the 2-stage compressor. The isentropic efficiency and the total pressure ratio of the compressor are increased near the design condition. The compressor total pressure ratio is decreased near choke and near stall. The maximum flow rate is reduced and the stall margin is decreased.     

导叶约化中心位置对涡轮非定常气动计算的影响

针对工程上常用的基于叶片数约化的涡轮非定常计算方法,为了掌握导叶约化中心位置对于涡轮内部流动非定常计算结果的影响规律,对导叶前缘约化、导叶尾缘约化、不约化三个算例进行了非定常计算与对比分析.研究结果表明:导叶前缘约化方式对于涡轮气动性能时均值影响量级在1％以上,而导叶尾缘约化方式的影响不到前者的1/2;两种约化方式均能...     

低速条件下展弦比对弯叶片扩压静叶栅流场性能的影响

为观察弯叶片在扩压叶栅中的适用条件,在保持其它条件不变的情况下,对一直列叶栅三种展弦比条件下的弯叶片流场进行了数值模拟。结果表明叶栅展弦比的大小对弯叶片在扩压叶栅中的作用影响较大,若展弦比增加,弯叶片改善叶栅性能的作用将增强。大展弦比叶栅中强弯叶片明显提高了吸力面角区密流系数的大小,从而改善了近端区的流场性能。在扩压叶栅中弯叶片可均化流场参数沿径向的分布,而在大展弦比叶栅中流场参数的径向分布差异较大,这应该是弯叶片在大展弦比叶栅中作用明显的主要原因。     

The change of the inlet geometry of a centrifugal compressor stage and its influence on the compressor performance

The impact on the compressor performance is important for designing the inlet pipe of the centrifugal compressor of a vehicle turbocharger with different inlet pipes. First, an experiment was performed to determine the compressor performance from three cases: a straight inlet pipe, a long bent inlet pipe and a short bent inlet pipe. Next, dynamic sensors were installed in key positions to collect the sign of the unsteady pressure of the centrifugal compressor. Combined with the results of numerical simulations, the total pressure distortion in the pipes, the pressure distributions on the blades and the pressure variability in the diffuser are studied in detail. The results can be summarized as follows: a bent pipe results in an inlet distortion to the compressor, which leads to performance degradation, and the effect is more apparent as the mass flow rate increases. The distortion induced by the bent inlet is not only influenced by the distance between the outlet of the bent section and the leading edge of the impeller but also by the impeller rotation. The flow fields in the centrifugal impeller and the diffuser are influenced by a coupling effect produced by the upstream inlet distortion and the downstream blocking effect from the volute tongue. If the inlet geometry is changed, the distributions and the fluctuation intensities of the static pressure on the main blade surface of the centrifugal impeller and in the diffuser are changed accordingly.     

Effects of probe support on the flow field of a low-speed axial compressor

This paper presents an investigation on the effect of probe support on the flow field of an axial compressor.The experiment is carried out in a large-scale low-speed research compressor.A cylindrical probe support intruding to 50% blade span was installed at 50% chord upstream from the rotor leading edge.The region from 5° to 32° off the probe support in the direction of rotation at the rotor outlet was measured with a 5-hole probe and a high-response total pressure probe.The experiment is performed at both near-design and near-stall points.The measuring results of 5-hole probe and high-response total pressure probe indicate that the probe blockage effect is different at different blade spans.The wake of the probe support weakens the leakage vortex intensity at the tip region,leading to greater total pressure rise.At near-design condition,the presence of probe support has a negative effect on the region from 75% to 92% span,while improves the flow field below 75% span.At near stall condition,the probe support has a negative effect on the region from 70% to 90% span,and almost has no influence on the flow field below 70% span.     

Combined effect of variable fluid properties on nonisothermal flow of an inelastic fluid with viscous heating

This study investigates the effect of variable thermal conductivity and variable viscosity on the flow characteristics and flow rates of an inelastic fluid, including viscous heating terms in the analysis. The exponential dependence of viscosity on temperature is modeled through Arrhenius law and shear rate dependence is modeled through Carreau rheological equation while it is assumed that the thermal conductivity varies linearly with temperature. Flow governing motion and energy balance equations are coupled and the solution is found iteratively facilitating a pseudospectral method based on the Chebyshev polynomial expansions. Effect of variable thermal conductivity and viscosity as well as the effect of power law index, material time constant, Brinkman and Peclet numbers on the velocity and temperature profiles are presented. Influence of the above parameters on the flow rate is also calculated.     

The effect of blade outlet angle on performance and internal flow condition of mini turbo-pump

Mini turbo-pumps having a diameter smaller than 100mm are employed in many fields; automobile radiator pump, ventricular assist pump, cooling pump for electric devices, washing machine pump and so on. Further, the needs for mini turbo-pumps would become larger with the increase of the application of it for electrical machines. It is desirable that the mini turbo-pump design is as simple as possible due to restriction to make precise manufactures. But the design method for the mini turbo-pump is not established because the internal flow condition for these small-sized fluid machineries is not clarified and conventional theory is not conductive for small-sized pumps. Three types of rotors with different outlet angles are prepared for an experiment and a numerical analysis. The performance tests are conducted with these rotors in order to investigate the effect of the blade outlet angle on performance and internal flow condition of mini turbo-pumps. It is clarified from the experimental results that head of the mini turbo-pump increases and maximum efficiency flow rate shifts to larger flow rate according to the increase of the blade outlet angle, however the maximum efficiency decreases with the increase of it. In the present paper, the performance of the mini turbo-pump is shown and the internal flow conditions are clarified with the results of the experiment and the numerical flow analysis. Furthermore, the effects of the blade outlet angle on the performance are investigated and high performance design with simple structure for the mini turbo-pump would be considered.     

Effect of diffuser vane shape on the performance of a centrifugal compressor stage

The present paper reports the results of experimental investigations on the effect of diffuser vane shape on the performance of a centrifugal compressor stage.These studies were conducted on the chosen stage having a backward curved impeller of 500 mm tip diameter and 24.5 mm width and its design flow coefficient is Фd=0.0535.Three different low solidity diffuser vane shapes namely uncambered aerofoil,constant thickness flat plate and circular arc cambered constant thickness plate were chosen as the variants for diffuser vane shape and all the three shapes have the same thickness to chord ratio(t/c=0.1).Flow coefficient,polytropic efficiency,total head coefficient,power coefficient and static pressure recovery coefficient were chosen as the parameters for evaluating the effect of diffuser vane shape on the stage performance.The results show that there is reasonable improvement in stage efficiency and total head coefficient with the use of the chosen diffuser vane shapes as compared to conventional vaneless diffuser.It is also noticed that the aero foil shaped LSD has shown better performance when compared to flat plate and circular arc profiles.The aerofoil vane shape of the diffuser blade is seen to be tolerant over a considerable range of incidence.