Investigation into the Interaction of Centrifugal Compressor Impeller and Vaneless Diffuser

Centrifugal compressors with parallel-wall and contracting wall vaneless diffuser are designed by using centrifugal compressor computer-aided integrated design system. The internal flow fields of the compressor are calculated by solving three-dimensional Navier-Stokes equation. Four aspects are investigated and calculation results show that the total efficiencies and total pressure ratios of the compressor with contracting wall vandess diffuser is higher than that of the compressor with parallel-wall. The jet and wake don＇t mix rapidly inside vandess diffuser. The outlet blade lean angle doesn＇t affect the compressor performance. The greater the mass flow rate through impeller, the more uneven the velocity distribution at impeller outlet is.

Stall Evolution Mechanism of a Centrifugal Compressor with a Wide-Long Vaneless Diffuser

The rotating stall mechanism is of high importance for the stability of centrifugal compressors and thermal power cycles.The majority of research concerning this topic has concentrated on the initial stall phase.However,the evolution of stall cells in wide-long diffusers has not been comprehensively studied.In this paper,the causes of rotating stall in the wide-long diffuser and the three-dimensional evolution mechanism of stall cells during the stall process were thoroughly analyzed.During the stall induction phase,an annulus vortex structure was found in the reverse-flow zone near the hub side of the diffuser outlet,which was the initial form of stall cells.The whole evolution process of stall cells was divided into three phases as the flow rate decreased.During the initial stall phase,the dynamic equilibrium was built under effects of the impeller wake and the adverse pressure gradient.As a result,the number of stall cells was kept at seven and the size of stall cells remained constant.During the transition phase,the flow in the diffuser became unstable.Stall cells extended to the impeller outlet,and the effect of the wake flow was strengthened significantly.Stall cells started integrating and separating regularly.As a result,the number and propagation speed of stall cells varied periodically at a constant mass flow rate.During the deep stall phase,the size of stall cells remained unchanged,and the number of stall cells kept at one.This study has important practical guidance and engineering value for the high-efficiency design and safe operation of centrifugal compressors.

Numerical Investigation of Rotating Stall in Centrifugal Compressor with Vaned and Vaneless Diffuser

This study presents a numerical simulation of the stall and surge in a centrifugal compressor and presents a description of the stall development in two different cases.The first case is for a compressor with vaneless diffuser and the second is for a compressor with vaned diffuser of the vane island shape.The main aim of this study is to compare the flow characteristics and behavior for the two compressors near the surge operating condition and provide further understanding of the diffuser role when back flow occurs at surge.Results showed that for a location near the diffuser entrance,the amplitude of the static pressure fluctuations for the vaneless diffuser case is higher than that for the vaned diffuser case near surge condition.These pressure fluctuations in the case of the vaneless diffuser appear with a gradual decrease of the mean pressure value as a part of the surge cycle.While for the case of the vaned diffuser,the pressure drop during surge occurs faster than the case of the vaneless diffuser.Also,results indicated that during surge in the case of vaneless diffuser,there is a region with low velocity and back flow that appears as a layer connecting all impeller passages near shroud surface and this layer develops in size with time.On the other hand,for the case of vaned diffuser during surge,the low velocity regions appear in random locations in some passages and these regions expand with time towards the shroud surface.Results showed that during stall,the impeller passages are exposed to identical impact from stall cells in the case of vaneless diffuser while the stall effect varies from passage to another in the case of the vaned diffuser.

Study of Rotating Stall in a Centrifugal Compressor with Wide Vaneless Diffuser

To study the stall mechanism in a wide vaneless diffuser,a three-dimensional centrifugal compressor model was established.The numerical simulation method was used to study the fluid characteristics in a centrifugal compressor with a wide vaneless diffuser under stall conditions.The simulated results showed that the wide vaneless diffuser stall was related to the instability of the core flow.Due to the influence of the reflow,the core flows moved between the hub and shroud side and the directions were not consistent.This was called core flow distortion,which triggered the rotating stall.The reflow first appeared at the outlet boundary of the diffuser,and the reflux gradually expanded to the inside of the diffuser as the impeller rotated.Eventually,the reflux zones grew and merged,forming a stable low-speed fluid regiment,which produced a stall cell.The stall cells rotated around themselves with an opposite direction with impeller.

Rotating instability in the vaneless diffuser of a radial flow pump

The paper refers to the behavior of a vaneless diffuser of a radial flow pump in partial flow operating conditions. Some experimental data have been obtained using 2D/2C PIV and unsteady pressure measurements within the diffuser, in various operating conditions. The experimental results at the lower flow rate are compared with two-dimensional numerical calculations.

Computational and Experimental Study of Pinch on the Performance of a Vaneless Diffuser in a Centrifugal Compressor

This study focuses on the vaneless diffuser of a centrifugal compressor. The examined stage consists of an unshrouded impeller, a parallel wall vaneless diffuser and a volute. The walls of the diffuser were movable allowing different pinch configurations to be investigated. The baseline geometry had no pinch i.e. the height of the diffuser was equal to the height of the impeller flow channel plus the axial running clearance. The work consists of both numerical and experimental parts. Quasi-steady, turbulent, fully 3D numerical simulations were conducted. The inlet cone, rotor and diffuser were modelled. Six different configurations were studied. The height of the pinch was altered and the pinch made to different walls was tested. Two of the numerically studied cases were also experimentally investigated. The overall performance of the compressor, the circumferential static and total pressure and the spanwise total pressure distribution before and after the diffuser were measured. The numerical and experimental studies showed that the pinch improved the efficiency of the compressor.

Receptivity and structural sensitivity study of the wide vaneless diffuser flow with adjoint method

The stability of the flow in the vaneless diffuser of a centrifugal compressor is studied with the linear theory. The characteristics of direct and adjoint perturbation modes are investigated,and the receptivity of the instability mode to momentum forcing or mass injection is identified based on the adjoint modes. Analysis shows that the perturbation with the largest amplitude is located at the outlet of the vaneless diffuser, while the highest-receptivity region is located in the middle of the vaneless diffuser along the radial direction. The large difference between the direct and adjoint modes indicates that the instability mechanism cannot be identified from a study of either eigenmode separately. Therefore, the structural sensitivity analysis is adopted to study the feedback of the instability mode. The structural sensitivity of the eigenvalue which is proportional to the perturbation pressure and velocity is used to explain the mechanism of flow control for the vaneless diffuser.

Behavior of Vaneless Diffuser Stall in a Centrifugal Compressor

The rotating stall in a centrifugal compressor with a vaneless diffuser was investigated both experimentally and numerically with focus on the effect of the internal flow field within the impeller on the diffuser stall.Through numerical analysis,the boundary layer separation at the impeller outlet was found to play an important role in the expansion and rotation processes of the diffuser stall.In particular,the expanded boundary layer separation near the hub side at the outlet of the main blade(M.B.)suction surface passage was considered to be the main cause of the expansion and rotation processes.A longitudinal vortex existed at the throat of the M.B.passage,and the mass flow rate in the M.B.passage was significantly reduced by the blockage effect.In addition,the longitudinal vortex induced the rolling up flow near the hub side at the impeller exit.Thus,the boundary layer separation expanded.

EXPERIMENTAL INVESTIGATION OF ROTATING STALL FOR A LOW-SPEED CENTRIFUGAL COMPRESSOR

Unsteady flows and rotating stall of a low-speed centrifugal compressor are investigated by measuring vaneless diffuser wall static pressure fluctuation and internal flow fields at different small flow fluxes. During the experiment, firstly the real time static pressure fluctuations on the vaneless diffuser shroud at different circumferential and radial position were acquired by high-frequency dynamic pressure transducers. Discrete Fourier transformation analysis and cross-correlation analysis were applied to the experimental results to ascertain the rotating stall beginning operation conditions and stall cells numbers and rotating speed. Secondly, the vaneless diffuser inlet flow angle distribution along diffuser width direction was acquired by single hotwire, which was compared with SENOO＇s analysis results. At last, the internal flow fields of the centrifugal compressor were investigated with a particle image velocimetry （PIV） system at different small flow fluxes. The flow field development of vaneless diffuser and blade flow passage are given at rotating stall conditions. The experiments enrich the understanding of rotating stall flow phenomenon of the low-speed centrifugal compressor and provide full experiment data for designing high performance centrifugal compressor.

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 back- ward curved impeller of 500 turn tip diameter and 24.5 mm width and its design flow coefficient is Фd=0.0535. Three different low solidity diffuser vane shapes namely uncarnbered 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 coeffi- cient, 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 conven- tional vaneless diffuser. It is also noticed that the aero foil shaped LSD has shown better performance when com- pared 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.