Numerical investigation and modeling of sweep effects on inlet flow field of axial compressor cascades

Swept blades are widely utilized in transonic compressors/fans and provide high load,high through-flow,high efficiency,and adequate stall margin.However,there is limited quantitative research on the mechanism of the effect of swept blades on the flow field,resulting in a lack of direct quantitative guidance for the design and analysis of swept blades in fans/compressors.To better understand this mechanism,this study employs a reduced-dimensional force equilibrium method to analyze more than 1500 swept cascades data.Results verify that circumferential fluctuation terms are responsible for inducing radial migration in the inlet airflow field of the swept blade,resulting in variations in the incidence angle and consequently leading to changes in the characteristics of the swept blade.Thus,a combination of simple functions and machine learning is utilized to model the circumferential fluctuation terms and quantify the sweep mechanism.The prediction accuracy of the model is high,with coefficient of determination greater than 0.95 on the test set.When the model is applied in a meridional flow analysis program,the calculation accuracy of the program for the incidence angle is improved by 0.4°and 0.6°at the design and off-design conditions respectively,compensating for the program’s original deficiencies.Meanwhile,the model can also provide quantitative guidance for the design of swept blades,thereby reducing the number of design iterations and improving design efficiency.

Numerical and experimental investigation of quantitative relationship between secondary flow intensity and inviscid blade force in axial compressors

The secondary flow attracts wide concerns in the aeroengine compressors since it has become one of the major loss sources in modern high-performance compressors.But the research about the quantitative relationship between secondary flow and inviscid blade force needs to be more detailed.In this paper,a database of 889 three-dimensional linear cascades was built.An indicator,called Secondary Flow Intensity(SFI),was used to express the loss caused by secondary flow.The quantitative relationship between the SFI and inviscid blade force deterioration was researched.Blade oil flow and Computation Fluid Dynamics(CFD)results of some cascades were also used to cross-validate.Results suggested that all numerical cascade cases can be divided into 3 clusters by the SFI,which are called Clusters A,B and C in the order of the increasing SFI indicator.The corner stall,known as the strong corner separation,only happens when the SFI is high.Both calculations and oil flow experiments show that the SFI would stay at a low level if the vortex core at the endwall surface does not appear.The strong interaction of Kutta condition and endwall cross-flow is considered the dominant mechanism of higher secondary flow losses,rather than the secondary flow penetration depth on the suction surface.In conclusion,the inviscid blade force spanwise deterioration is strongly related to the SFI.The correlation of the SFI and spanwise inviscid blade force deterioration is given in this paper.The correlation could provide a quantitative reference for estimating secondary flow losses in the design.

Static pressure redistribution mechanism of non-axisymmetric endwall based on radial equilibrium

Non-axisymmetric endwall contouring has been proved to be an effective flow control technique in turbomachinery.Several different flow control mechanisms and qualitative design strategies have been proposed.The endwall contouring mechanism based on the flow governing equations is significant for exploring the quantitative design strategies of the nonaxisymmetric endwall contouring.In this paper,the static pressure redistribution mechanism of endwall contouring was explained based on the radial equilibrium equation.A quantified expression of the static pressure redistribution mechanism was proposed.Compressor cascades were simulated using an experimentally validated numerical method to validate the static pressure redistribution mechanism.A geometric parameter named meridional curvature(Cme)is defined to quantify the concave and convex features of the endwall.Results indicate that the contoured endwall changes the streamline curvature,inducing a centrifugal acceleration.Consequently,the radial pressure gradient is reformed to maintain the radial equilibrium.The convex endwall represented by positive Cme increases the radial pressure gradient,decreasing the endwall static pressure,while the concave endwall represented by negative Cme increases the endwall static pressure.The Cme helps to establish the quantified relation between the change in the endwall radial pressure gradient and the endwall geometry.Besides,there is a great correlation between the distributions of the Cme and the change in the endwall static pressure.It can be concluded that the parameter Cme can be considered as a significant parameter to parameterize the endwall surface and to explore the quantitative design strategies of the nonaxisymmetric endwall contouring.

Effects of Inlet Circumferential Fluctuation on the Sweep Aerodynamic Performance of Axial Fans/Compressors

Swept blades have been widely used in the transonic fan/compressor of aircraft engines with the aids of 3D CFD simulation since the design concept of controlling the shock structure was firstly proposed and successfully tested by Dr.Wennerstrom in the 1980s.However,some disadvantage phenomenon has also been induced by excessively 3D blade geometries on the structure stress insufficiency,vibration and reliability.Much confusion in the procedure of design practice leading us to recognize a new view on the flow mechanism of sweep aerodynamical induction: the new radial equilibrium established by the influence of inlet circumferential fluctuation(CF) changes the inlet flows of blading and induces the performance modification of axial fans/compressors blade.The view is verified by simplified models through numerical simulation and circumferentially averaged analysis in the present paper.The results show that the CF source items which originate from design parameters,such as the spanwise distributions of the loading and blading geometries,contribute to the changing of averaged incidence spanwise distribution,and further more affect the performance of axial fans/compressors with swept blades.

Influence of Non-Axisymmetric Terms on Circumferentially Averaged Method in Fan/Compressor

The governing equations are derived by circumferentially averaging the three-dimensional(3D) Navier-Stokes equations,which are solved using a time marching finite volume approach.Both Euler throughflow model and Navier-Stokes(N-S) throughflow model are employed to investigate the performance and flow fields of a highly loaded transonic single-stage fan ATS-2 and a four-stage fan.The results are compared with the experimental and three-dimensional computational results.It shows that the throughflow models can provide reasonable performance characteristics and N-S throughflow model gives better predictions in endwall regions.A throughflow computation n in which all the non-axisymmetric terms are included has been performed at off-design condition and the radial distributions of the flow field can be well described.

Blade bowing effects on radial equilibrium of inlet flow in axial compressor cascades

The circumferentially averaged equation of the inlet flow radial equilibrium in axial compressor was deduced. It indicates that the blade inlet radial pressure gradient is closely related to the radial component of the circumferential fluctuation（CF） source item. Several simplified cascades with/without aerodynamic loading were numerically studied to investigate the effects of blade bowing on the inlet flow radial equilibrium. A data reduction program was conducted to obtain the CF source from three-dimensional（3D） simulation results. Flow parameters at the passage inlet were focused on and each term in the radial equilibrium equation was discussed quantitatively. Results indicate that the inviscid blade force is the inducement of the inlet CF due to geometrical asymmetry. Blade bowing induces variation of the inlet CF, thus changes the radial pressure gradient and leads to flow migration before leading edge（LE） in the cascades. Positive bowing drives the inlet flow to migrate from end walls to mid-span and negative bowing turns it to the reverse direction to build a new equilibrium. In addition, comparative studies indicate that the inlet Mach number and blade loading can efficiently impact the effectiveness of blade bowing on radial equilibrium in compressor design.

Particle Image Velocimetry Experimental and Computational Investigation of a Blood Pump

Blood pumps have been adopted to treat heart failure over the past decades.A novel blood pump adopting the ro-tor with splitter blades and tandem cascade stator was developed recently.A particle image velocimetry (PIV) experiment was carried out to verify the design of the blood pump based on computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and further analyze the flow properties in the rotor and stator.The original sized pump model with an acrylic housing and an experiment loop were constructed to perform the optical measurement.The PIV testing was car-ried out at the rotational speed of 6952±50 r/min with the flow rate of 3.1 l/min and at 8186±50 r/min with 3.5 l/min,respectively.The velocity and the Reynolds shear stress distributions were investigated by PIV and CFD,and the comparisons between them will be helpful for the future blood pump design.

A spanwise loss model for axial compressor stator based on machine learning

In the early stage of aircraft engine design, the through-flow method is an important tool for designers. The accuracy of the through-flow method depends heavily on the accuracy of the loss model. However, most existing models cannot(or cannot well) provide the spanwise loss distribution. To construct an effective spanwise loss model, both turbomachinery knowledge and machine learning skills were used in this paper. A large number of numerical simulations were carried out to build a database containing more than 1000 compressor cascade numerical samples. Secondary flow intensity was introduced as the independent variable to carry out feature engineering. A model containing a selector based on support vector machine regression and estimators based on K-nearest neighbor regression was constructed. Numerical test set and design data of two former highpressure core compressors were used for validation. Results suggest that the spanwise loss model show good consistency with both numerical test set and data of two former compressors. It can reflect the influence of secondary flow and can also predict both value and trend of total pressure loss coefficient well, with mean absolute error general around or less than 1% and R^(2)(coefficient of determination) more than 0.8 on the test set. Especially when dealing with loss coefficient at midspan position, the model shows even better performance, with R^(2)over 0.97 on the test set. And the selector of the model can well classify the samples, predict the intensity of secondary flow and help estimators to capture the phenomenon that end-wall secondary flow extends to the mid-span.