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Labyrinth seals are widely used in rotating machinery and have been shown to experience aeroelastic instabilities. The rapid development of computational fluid dynamics now provides a high fidelity approach for predicting the aeroelastic behavior of labyrinth seals in three dimension and exhibits great potential within industrial application, especially during the detailed design stages. In the current publication a time-marching unsteady Reynolds- averaged Navier-Stokes solver was employed to study the various historically identified parameters that have essential influence on the stability of labyrinth seals. Advances in understanding of the related aeroelastic (flutter) phenomenon were achieved based on extensive yet economical numerical analysis of a simplified seal model. Further, application of the same methodology to several realistic gas turbine labyrinth seal designs confirmed the perceived knowledge and received agreements from experimental indications. Abbott’s criteria in describing the labyrinth seal aeroelastic behaviors were reaffirmed and further developed.

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Inlet distortion is an important consideration in fan performance. Distortion can be generated through flight conditions and airframe-engine interfaces. The focus of this paper is a series of high-fidelity, time-accurate Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations of a multistage fan, investigating distortion transfer, distortion generation, and the underlying flow physics under different operating conditions. The simulations are full annulus and include 3 stages and the inlet guide vane (IGV). The code used to carry out these simulations is a modified version of Overflow2.2 that was developed as part of the Computational Research and Engineering Acquisition Tools and Environment (CREATE) program. The inlet boundary condition is a single revolution (sinusoidal pattern with one period over the circumference ) total pressure distortion. Simulations at choke, design, and near stall are analyzed and compared to experimental data. Distortion transfer and generation is analyzed under these different operating conditions. Analysis includes the phase and amplitude of total temperature and pressure distortion through each stage of the fan, level of distortion transfer and generation in each stage, and blade loading. An understanding of the flow physics associated with distorted flows will help fan designers account for unsteady flow physics at design and off-design operating conditions, in order to build more robust fans offering a greater stability margin.

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A miniature centrifugal compressor is a key component of a reverse Brayton cycle cryogenic cooling system. The system is commonly used to generate a low cryogenic temperature environment for electronics to increase their efficiency, or generate, store and transport cryogenic liquids, such as liquid hydrogen and oxygen, where space limit is also an issue. Because of space limitation, the compressor is composed of a radial inlet guide vane, a radial impeller and an axial-direction diffuser (which reduces the radial size because of smaller diameter). As a result of reduction in size, in order to obtain the required static pressure ratio/rise, the rotating speed of the impeller is as high as 313 KRPM, if Helium is used as the working fluid. Two main characteristics of the compressor – miniature and high-speed, make it distinct from conventional compressors. Higher compressor efficiency is required to obtain a higher COP (coefficient of performance) system. Even though miniature centrifugal compressors start to draw researchers' attention in recent years, understanding of the performance and loss mechanism is still lacking. Since current experimental techniques are not advanced enough to capture details of flow at miniature scale, numerical methods dominate miniature turbomachinery study. This work numerically studied a high speed miniature centrifugal compressor. The length and diameter are 7 cm and 6 cm, respectively. The study was done on the same physical compressor but with three different combinations of working fluid and operating speed combinations: air and 108 KRPM, helium and 313 KRPM, and neon and 141 KRPM. The overall performance of the compressor was predicted with consideration of interaction between blade rows by using a sliding mesh model. It was found that the specific heat ratio needs to be considered when similarity law is applied. But Reynolds number effect can be neglected. The maximum efficiency observed without any tip leakage was 70.2% for air 64.8% for helium 64.9% for neon. The loss mechanism of each component was analyzed. Loss due to turning bend was found to be significant in each component, even up to 30%. Tip leakage loss of small scale turbomachines has more impact on the impeller performance than that of large scale ones. Use of 10% tip gap was found to reduce impeller efficiency from 99% to 90%. Because the splitter was located downstream of the impeller leading edge, any incidence at the impeller leading edge leads to poorer splitter performance. Therefore, the impeller with twenty blades had higher isentropic efficiency than the impeller with ten blades and ten splitters. Based on numerical study, a four-row vaned diffuser was used to replace a two-row vaned diffuser. It was found that the four-row vaned diffuser had much higher pressure recovery coefficient than the two-row vaned diffuser. However, most of pressure is found to be recovered at the first two rows of diffuser vanes. Consequently, the following suggestions were given to further improve the performance of the miniature centrifugal compressor. 1. Redesign inlet guide vane based on the numerical simulation and experimental results. 2. Add de-swirl vanes in front of the diffuser and before the bend. 3. Replace the current impeller with a twenty-blade impeller. 4. Remove the last row of diffuser.

This report describes the development and application of a validated Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) modelling approach for internal cooling passages in rotating turbomachinery. A CFD Modelling approach and accompanying assumptions are tuned and validated against academically available experimental results for various serpentine passages. Criteria of the CFD modelling approach selected for investigation into advanced internal cooling flows include accuracy, robustness, industry familiarity, and computational cost. Experimental data from NASA HOST (HOt Section Technology), Texas A&M, and University of Manchester tests are compared to RANS CFD results generated using Fluent v14.5 in order to benchmark a CFD modelling approach. Capability of various turbulence models in the representation of cooling physics is evaluated against experimental data. Model sensitivity to boundary conditions and mesh density is also evaluated. The development of a validated computational model of internal turbine cooling channels with bounded error allows for the identification of particular shortcomings of heat transfer correlations and provides a baseline for future CFD based exploration of internal turbine cooling concepts.

A new pressure-measurement technique which employs the tools of molecular spectroscopy has recently received considerable attention in the fluid mechanics community. Measurements are made via oxygen-sensitive molecules attached to the surface of interest as a coating, or paint. The pressure-sensitive-paint (PSP) technique is now commonly used in stationary wind-tunnel tests; this thesis presents the extension of the technique to advanced turbomachinery applications. New pressure- and temperature-sensitive paints (TSPs) have been developed for application to a state-of-the-art transonic compressor where pressures up to 2 atm and surface temperatures up to 140° C are expected for the first-stage rotor. PSP and TSP data has been acquired from the suction surface of the first-stage rotor of a transonic compressor operating at its peak-efficiency condition. The shock structure is clearly visible in the pressure image, and visual comparison to the corresponding computational fluid dynamics (CFD) prediction shows qualitative agreement to the PSP data. / Master of Science

A pre-optimizer has been developed which modifies existing turbomachinery blades to create new geometries with improved selected aerodynamic coefficients calculated using a linear panel method. These blade rows can then be further refined using a Navier-Stokes method for evaluation. This pre-optimizer was developed in hopes of reducing the overall CPU time required for optimization when using only Navier-Stokes evaluations. The primary method chosen to effect this optimization is a parallel evolutionary algorithm. Variations of this method have been analyzed and compared for convergence and degree of improvement. Test cases involved both single and multiple row turbomachinery. For each case, both single and multiple criteria fitness evaluations were used.