No description available.

<p>The objective of this work is to provide a computational baseline for modelling the flow physics in the tip region of a transonic fan. A transonic fan was donated by Honeywell Aerospace to the Purdue University High-Speed Compressor Research Laboratory for the purposes of studying casing treatments and inlet distortion under the Office of Naval Research Power and Propulsion Program. The purpose of casing treatment is to extend the stall margin of the fan without being detrimental to fan efficiency. Hence, before an effective casing treatment can be designed, understanding the instabilities that lead to stall or surge and understanding the flow field near the rotor tip at different operating conditions is necessary. </p> <p>The behavior of the flow field was studied at design speed using steady simulations for near stall, peak efficiency, and choke operating conditions. The details of the passage shock, tip leakage vortex, and the shock-vortex interaction were investigated. The passage shock moves forward in the rotor passage as the loading increases, until eventually becoming unstarted near stall. The tip leakage vortex convects from the rotor tip leading edge to the pressure side of the adjacent blade, and its trajectory becomes parallel to the rotor inlet plane as the loading increases. The shock-vortex interaction does not cause the tip leakage vortex to breakdown, although distortion of the shock front and diffusion of the tip leakage vortex is significant near stall.</p> <p>To validate this computational model, steady simulations were used to conduct a grid convergence study. A single passage mesh of 8 million elements is sufficient to capture the flow qualitatively, but a mesh of at least 22 million elements is recommended to lower discretization error if quantitative details are important. A brief comparison of turbulence models is made, and the SST model was found to predict stronger radial flows than the BSL-EARSM and BSL-RSM models. However, the SST model still captures the flow features qualitatively, and the more complex models would be too costly for iterative design simulations.</p> <p>The importance of unsteady effects was also considered for a point near peak efficiency. Near peak efficiency, the effect of shock oscillations near the rotor shroud are small. Compared to steady simulations, the unsteady simulation predicts a slightly stronger horseshoe vortex at the hub and a passage shock closer to the rotor leading edge. The tip leakage vortex trajectory appears to be the same between the steady and unsteady simulations.</p> <p>The modelling decisions made in this research are currently only based on comparison between simulations. This model will be calibrated with experimental data in the future to provide a more accurate view of the flow physics inside this transonic fan.</p>

A new method for predicting forced vibratory blade response to total pressure distortion has been developed using modal and harmonic analysis. Total pressure distortions occur in gas turbine engines when the incoming airflow is partially blocked or disturbed. Distorted inlet conditions can have varying effects on engine performance and engine life. Short-term effects are often in the form of performance degradation where the distorted airflow causes a loss in pressure rise, and a reduction in mass flow and stall margin. Long-term effects are a result of vibratory blade response that can ultimately lead to high cycle fatigue (HCF), which in turn can quickly cause partial damage to a single blade or complete destruction of an entire compressor blade row, leading to catastrophic failure of the gas turbine engine. A better understanding and prediction of vibratory blade response is critical to extending engine life and reducing HCF-induced engine failures. This work covers the use of finite element modeling coupled with computational fluid dynamics-generated pressure fields to create a generalized forcing function. The first three modes of a low-aspect-ratio, transonic, first stage blade of a two-stage fan were examined. The generalized forcing function was decomposed to the frequency domain to identify the dominant harmonic magnitude present, as well as other contributing harmonics. An attempt to define the relationship between modal force with varying total pressure distortion levels produced a sensitivity factor that describes the relationship in the form of a simple multiplier. A generalized force was applied to the blade and varied harmonically across a frequency range known to contain the first natural frequency. The mean rotor stress variation was recorded and compared to experimental results to validate the accuracy of the model and verify its ability to predict vibratory blade response accurately. / Master of Science

Simultaneous Perturbation Stochastic Approximation method has attracted considerable application in many different areas such as statistical parameter estimation, feedback control, simulation-based optimization, signal & image processing, and experimental design. In this paper, its performance as a viable optimization tool is demonstrated by applying it first to a simple wing geometry design problem for which the objective function is described by an empirical formula from aircraft design practice and then it is used in a transonic fan blade design problem in which the objective function is not represented by any explicit function but is estimated at each design iteration by a computational fluid dynamics algorithm for solving the Navier-Stokes equations / Singapore-MIT Alliance (SMA)

This dissertation provides numerical studies to improve bladed disk assembly design for preventing blade high cycle fatigue failures. The analyses are divided into two major subjects. For the first subject presented in Chapter 2, the mechanisms of transonic fan flutter for tuned systems are studied to improve the shortcoming of traditional method for modern fans using a 3D time-linearized Navier-Stokes solver. Steady and unsteady flow parameters including local work on the blade surfaces are investigated. It was found that global local work monotonically became more unstable on the pressure side due to the flow rollback effect. The local work on the suction side significantly varied due to nodal diameter and flow rollback effect. Thus, the total local work for the least stable mode is dominant by the suction side. Local work on the pressure side appears to be affected by the shock on the suction side. For the second subject presented in Chapter 3, sensitivity studies are conducted on flutter and forced response due to frequency mistuning and aerodynamic asymmetry using the single family of modes approach by assuming manufacturing tolerance. The unsteady aerodynamic forces are computed using CFD methods assuming aerodynamic symmetry. The aerodynamic asymmetry is applied by perturbing the influence coefficient matrix. These aerodynamic perturbations influence both stiffness and damping while traditional frequency mistuning analysis only perturbs the stiffness. Flutter results from random aerodynamic perturbations of all blades showed that manufacturing variations that effect blade unsteady aerodynamics may cause a stable, perfectly symmetric engine to flutter. For forced response, maximum blade amplitudes are significantly influenced by the aerodynamic perturbation of the imaginary part (damping) of unsteady aerodynamic modal forces. This is contrary to blade frequency mistuning where the stiffness perturbation dominates. / Dissertation

No description available.

En phase d’approche, le bruit rayonné par l’entrée d’air des turboréacteurs est principalement dû aux interactions entre le rotor et le stator. Cependant les ondes de choc (ou ondes en N) générées par le rotor en régime transsonique peuvent devenir une source de bruit dominante durant le décollage et la montée de l’appareil. L’étude des ondes en N nécessite de se concentrer sur deux processus majeurs : 1) la génération des chocs par un rotor parfait (dont toutes les aubes sont identiques) et par un rotor réel (en tenant compte des irrégularités géométriques des aubes), et 2) la propagation de ces ondes en N à travers la nacelle, produisant du bruit dont le spectre se compose des harmoniques de la fréquence de passage des aubes pour un rotor régulier, et des harmoniques aux fréquences multiples de la rotation du rotor (FMR) pour un rotor irrégulier. Plusieurs approches analytiques et numériques ont été développées durant les 40 dernières années.Cette thèse relate dans un tout premier temps les principales théories de la propagation des ondes de choc ainsi que les modèles majeurs de génération de FMR. Une attention particulière est portée sur les liens entre les équations générales de la mécanique des fluides et ces modèles de propagation non linéaire afin de mettre en évidence les différentes hypothèses formulées dans ces modèles. Dans un deuxième temps, les principales méthodes semi-analytiques de génération et de propagation des chocs seront évaluées et comparées en les appliquant à des configurations de turboréacteurs. En outre, un nouveau modèle de génération de FMR basé sur des considérations géométriques est élaboré par l’intermédiaire d’une campagne d’essais comportant d’une part des mesures de signaux de pression dans la nacelle et d’autre part les mesures des angles de calage des aubes pendant le fonctionnement du moteur. Le deuxième volet de la thèse concerne le développement d’une méthodologie de simulation numérique basée sur l’utilisation du code elsA de l’ONERA en résolvant les équations d’Euler (approche CAA). L’objectif de cette approche est de s’affranchir des limitations des modèles de propagation semi-analytiques et de tenir compte de la géométrie réelle de la nacelle ainsi que d’un écoulement réaliste. Des ondes de choc régulières et irrégulières sont directement injectées dans un plan proche de la soufflante et se propagent en remontant l’écoulement. Ces ondes de choc sont injectées par l’intermédiaire d’une condition limite de non-réflexion qui nécessite d’imposer le champ conservatif. La signature des chocs peut provenir d’un RANS, de mesures ou d’un signal analytique. Étant donné que les mesures ou le signal théorique ne permettent d’obtenir que la pression, une méthode de reconstruction du champ conservatif à partir des variations de pression induites par le choc a été élaborée. Cette méthode d’injection est tout d’abord appliquée à un conduit annulaire infiniment mince et validée par la méthode de propagation semi-analytique de McAlpine & Fisher. Ensuite, les effets de propagation 3D sont étudiés en augmentant l’épaisseur du conduit. Enfin, la méthode CAA est appliquée à des configurations de turboréacteurs modernes et des ondes de choc régulières et irrégulières sont propagées numériquement. Les résultats sont comparés aux solutions RANS ainsi qu’aux mesures disponibles. / Whereas the sound radiated from the inlet of turbofans is mainly due to rotor–stator interactions in approach flight, the shock waves (or N-waves) emitted by the rotor at transonic rotation speeds can be a dominant noise source during takeoff and climb. The study of N-waves needs to take account of two main processes: 1) the generation of N-waves for a perfect rotor (in which all blades are identical) and for a real rotor (considering small geometrical blade dispersion), and 2) the N-wave propagation through the inlet duct producing the blade passing harmonics for a perfect rotor, and the multiple pure tones (harmonics of the rotation frequency) for a real rotor. Several analytical and numerical approaches have been investigated for the past 40 years.This thesis first intends to relate the main propagation theories and to address the foremost MPT generation method hypotheses. The links between fluid dynamics equations and practical non-linear theories currently adopted are emphasized and discussed. In a second step, the main relevant semi-analytical methods are cross-checked by applying them to representative turbofan configurations. Moreover, a novel model of irregular N-wave generation based on geometrical considerations is investigated thanks to test data related to in-duct pressure signatures and blade stagger angle measurements during the engine operation. Then, a second part of the work investigates a numerical strategy based on elsA ONERA code, solving the full Euler’s equations (CAA approach). The objective is to prevent from the limitations of 2D analytical models and to take into account actual inlet geometry and realistic convection flow. Regular and non-regular shock waves are directly injected in a plane close to the fan and propagated through the inlet. These shock waves are injected through a non-reflective boundary condition which requires the conservative field. The initial shock description near the fan is provided either by a RANS computation or by experiment, or else from analytical model. As experiment or analytical signals only provide pressure signatures, a theory is set up to re-built the whole conservative field from the basis of a pressure shockwave. This injection method is firstly applied on an infinitely narrow annular duct and validated through the comparison with the McAlpine & Fisher analytical method. Then, the 3D propagation effects are pointed out by increasing the duct height. Finally, the CAA method is applied on actual intake geometry of modern turbofan demonstrators, and propagation of regular and irregular shock-waves are simulated. The numerical results are compared to RANS solutions and to available measurements.