Search NASA⌕ Search

SEARCH · Search NASA

Results for “CASCADE FLOW”

Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.

At least 253 records · Page 14

A FORTRAN computer code for calculating flows in multiple-blade-element cascades

A solution technique has been developed for solving the multiple-blade-element, surface-of-revolution, blade-to-blade flow problem in turbomachinery. The calculation solves approximate flow equations which include the effects of compressibility, radius change, blade-row rotation, and variable stream sheet thickness. An integral equation solution (i.e., panel method) is used to solve the equations. A description of the computer code and computer code input is given in this report.

Mcfarland, E. R.↗

Aeroelastic characteristics of a cascade of mistuned blades in subsonic and supersonic flows

The effects of mistuning on flutter and forced response of a cascade in subsonic in subsonic and supersonic flow were investigated. The aerodynamic and structural coupling between the bending and torsional motions and the aerodynamic coupling between the blades were studied. It is shown that frequency mistuning always has a beneficial effect on flutter. For the cascade considered, the potential for raising flutter speed is greater in subsonic than in supersonic flow. Preliminary results for structural damping mistuning show that there are no additional benefits over adding damping mistuning may have either a beneficial or an adverse effect on forced response, depending on the engine order of the excitation and Mach number.

Kielb, R. E.↗

Flow of Gas Through Turbine Lattices

This report is concerned with fluid mechanics of two-dimensional cascades, particularly turbine cascades. Methods of solving the incompressible ideal flow in cascades are presented. The causes and the order of magnitude of the two-dimensional losses at subsonic velocities are discussed. Methods are presented for estimating the flow and losses at high subsonic velocities. Transonic and supersonic flows in lattices are then analyzed. Some three-dimensional features of the flow in turbines are noted.

BOUNDARY LAYER - AIRFOILS - CASCADES↗

Aeroelastic characteristics of a cascade of mistuned blades in subsonic and supersonic flows

An investigation of the effects of mistuning on flutter and forced response of a cascade in subsonic and supersonic flows is presented. The aerodynamic and structural coupling between the bending and torsional motions and the aerodynamic coupling between the blades are included. It is shown that frequency mistuning always has a beneficial effect on flutter. Additionally, the results indicate that frequency mistuning may have either a beneficial or an adverse effect on forced response, depending on the engine order of the excitation and Mach number.

Kielb, R. E.↗

Blade selection for a modern axial-flow compressor

The procedures leading to successful design of an axial flow compressor are discussed. The three related approaches to cascade selection are: (1) experimental approach which relies on the use of experimental results from identical cascades to satisfy the velocity diagrams calculated, (2) a purely analytical procedure whereby blade shapes are calculated from the theoretical cascade and viscous flow equations, and (3) a semiempirical procedure which used experimental data together with the theoretically derived functional relations to relate the cascade parameters. Diagrams of typical transonic blade sections with uncambered leading edges are presented.

Wright, L. C.↗

Two recent extensions of the vortex method

The vortex method, coupled to an integral boundary-layer solver, is applied to the numerical simulation of high-Reynolds-number, separated flows in two new cases: a bluff body in a wind tunnel and flow in a cascade. In the bluff body case, the blockage effect of the tunnel walls is included approximately, assuming an inviscid boundary condition at the walls. The resulting increase in drag is computed, and compares well with a small-disturbance theory and with experiments. The results for flow in a cascade are compared with results from two finite-difference codes for a single-blade case, and good agreement is found. When a staggered cascade is treated with five independent blades, the simulation predicts rotating stall, depending on the angle of attack, and the essential features of the flow are correct. The sensitivity of this phenomenon to various parameters is studied and the stall boundary is found.

Spalart, P. R.↗

Evaluation of diffuse-illumination holographic cinematography in a flutter cascade

Since 1979, the Lewis Research Center has examined holographic cinematography for three-dimensional flow visualization. The Nd:YAG lasers used were Q-switched, double-pulsed, and frequency-doubled, operating at 20 pulses per second. The primary subjects for flow visualization were the shock waves produced in two flutter cascades. Flow visualization was by diffuse-illumination, double-exposure, and holographic interferometry. The performances of the lasers, holography, and diffuse-illumination interferometry are evaluated in single-window wind tunnels. The fringe-contrast factor is used to evaluate the results. The effects of turbulence on shock-wave visualization in a transonic flow are discussed. The depth of field for visualization of a turbulent structure is demonstrated to be a measure of the relative density and scale of that structure. Other items discussed are the holographic emulsion, tests of coherence and polarization, effects of windows and diffusers, hologram bleaching, laser configurations, influence and handling of specular reflections, modes of fringe localization, noise sources, and coherence requirements as a function of the pulse energy. Holography and diffuse illumination interferometry are also reviewed.

Decker, A. J.↗

Use of Pressure Sensitive Paint for Diagnostics in Turbomachinery Flows With Shocks

The technology of pressure sensitive paint (PSP) is well established in external aerodynamics. In internal flows in narrow channels and in turbomachinery cascades, however, there are still unresolved problems. In particular, the internal flows with complex shock structures inside highly curved channels present a challenge. It is not always easy and straightforward to distinguish between true signals and "ghost" images due to multiple internal reflections in narrow channels. To address some of the problems, investigations were first carried out in a narrow supersonic channel of Mach number 2.5. A single wedge or a combination of two wedges were used to generate a complex shock wave structure in the flow. The experience gained in a small supersonic channel was used for surface pressure measurements on the stator vane of a supersonic throughflow fan. The experimental results for several fan operating conditions are shown in a concise form, including performance map points, midspan static tap pressure distributions, and vane suction side pressure fields. Finally, the PSP technique was used in the NASA transonic flutter cascade to compliment flow visualization data and to acquire backwall pressure fields to assess the cascade flow periodicity. A summary of shortcomings of the pressure sensitive paint technology for internal flow application and lessons learned are presented in the conclusion of the paper.

Lepicovsky, Jan↗

Multipoint inverse design of an infinite cascade of airfoils

This paper describes a method for the design of an infinite cascade in incompressible flow. The method is based on conformal mapping and does not allow for multipoint design. The cascade blade is to determined is divided into a number of segments. Over each segment, the velocity distribution is prescribed together with an inlet or outlet flow angle at which this velocity distributions is to be achieved. In this way multipoint design requirements can be met. It is necessary to satisfy several conditions that arise to guarantee compatibility with the inlet and outlet flow as well as closure of the cascade blade. Satisfaction of these conditions does not necessarily result in a cascade with all of the desired characteristucs. For example, the cascade blades may be bulbous or crossed. Through Newtonian iteration, however, the desired characteristics may be prescribed directly. Four examples will be illustrated to demonstrate the capability of the method.

Selig, M. S.↗

Environmental solid particle effects on compressor cascade performance

The effect of suspended solid particles on the performance of the compressor cascade was investigated experimentally in a specially built cascade tunnel, using quartz sand particles. The cascades were made of NACA 65(10)10 airfoils. Three cascades were tested, one accelerating cascade and two diffusing cascades. The theoretical analysis assumes inviscid and incompressible two dimensional flow. The momentum exchange between the fluid and the particle is accounted for by the interphase force terms in the fluid momentum equation. The modified fluid phase momentum equations and the continuity equation are reduced to the conventional stream function vorticity formulation. The method treats the fluid phase in the Eulerian system and the particle phase in Lagrangian system. The experimental results indicate a small increase in the blade surface static pressures, while the theoretical results indicate a small decrease. The theoretical analysis, also predicts the loss in total pressure associated with the particulate flow through the cascade.

Tabakoff, W.↗

DNS of Flow in a Low-Pressure Turbine Cascade Using a Discontinuous-Galerkin Spectral-Element Method

A new computational capability under development for accurate and efficient high-fidelity direct numerical simulation (DNS) and large eddy simulation (LES) of turbomachinery is described. This capability is based on an entropy-stable Discontinuous-Galerkin spectral-element approach that extends to arbitrarily high orders of spatial and temporal accuracy and is implemented in a computationally efficient manner on a modern high performance computer architecture. A validation study using this method to perform DNS of flow in a low-pressure turbine airfoil cascade are presented. Preliminary results indicate that the method captures the main features of the flow. Discrepancies between the predicted results and the experiments are likely due to the effects of freestream turbulence not being included in the simulation and will be addressed in the final paper.

Low-Pressure Turbine Cascade↗

A computational design method for transonic turbomachinery cascades

This paper describes a systematical computational procedure to find configuration changes necessary to modify the resulting flow past turbomachinery cascades, channels and nozzles, to be shock-free at prescribed transonic operating conditions. The method is based on a finite area transonic analysis technique and the fictitious gas approach. This design scheme has two major areas of application. First, it can be used for design of supercritical cascades, with applications mainly in compressor blade design. Second, it provides subsonic inlet shapes including sonic surfaces with suitable initial data for the design of supersonic (accelerated) exits, like nozzles and turbine cascade shapes. This fast, accurate and economical method with a proven potential for applications to three-dimensional flows is illustrated by some design examples.

Sobieczky, H.↗

Multi-point inverse design of an infinite cascade of airfoils

This paper describes a practical method for the design of an infinite cascade in incompressible flow. The method is based on conformal mapping, and as a result it allows for multi-point design. The cascade blade to be determined is divided into a desired number of segments. Over each segment, the velocity distribution is prescribed together with an inlet or outlet flow angle at which this velocity distribution is to be achieved. In this way multi-point design requirements can be met. It is necessary to satisfy several conditions that arise to guarantee compatibility with the inlet and outlet flow as well as closure of the cascade blade. Satisfaction of these conditions does not necessarily result in a cascade with all the desired characteristics. For example, the cascade blades may be bulbous or crossed. Through Newton iteration, however, the desired characteristics may be prescribed by allowing for the adjustment of the design parameters that define the mathematical problem through conformal mapping. Several examples will be illustrated to demonstrate the capability of the method. It will be shown that the method is limited to the design of cascades with solidities of up to one.

Selig, Michael S.↗

Aeroacoustic sensitivity analysis and optimal aeroacoustic design of turbomachinery blades

During the first year of the project, we have developed a theoretical analysis - and wrote a computer code based on this analysis - to compute the sensitivity of unsteady aerodynamic loads acting on airfoils in cascades due to small changes in airfoil geometry. The steady and unsteady flow though a cascade of airfoils is computed using the full potential equation. Once the nominal solutions have been computed, one computes the sensitivity. The analysis takes advantage of the fact that LU decomposition is used to compute the nominal steady and unsteady flow fields. If the LU factors are saved, then the computer time required to compute the sensitivity of both the steady and unsteady flows to changes in airfoil geometry is quite small. The results to date are quite encouraging, and may be summarized as follows: (1) The sensitivity procedure has been validated by comparing the results obtained by 'finite difference' techniques, that is, computing the flow using the nominal flow solver for two slightly different airfoils and differencing the results. The 'analytic' solution computed using the method developed under this grant and the finite difference results are found to be in almost perfect agreement. (2) The present sensitivity analysis is computationally much more efficient than finite difference techniques. We found that using a 129 by 33 node computational grid, the present sensitivity analysis can compute the steady flow sensitivity about ten times more efficiently that the finite difference approach. For the unsteady flow problem, the present sensitivity analysis is about two and one-half times as fast as the finite difference approach. We expect that the relative efficiencies will be even larger for the finer grids which will be used to compute high frequency aeroacoustic solutions. Computational results show that the sensitivity analysis is valid for small to moderate sized design perturbations. (3) We found that the sensitivity analysis provided important insight into how airfoils should be modified to improve their aeroelastic stability. Using this insight, we redesigned an aeroelastically unstable cascade to produce a stable cascade.

Hall, Kenneth C.↗

Navier-Stokes cascade analysis with a stiff Kappa-Epsilon turbulence solver

The two dimensional, compressible, thin layer Navier-Stokes equations with the Baldwin-Lomax turbulence model and the kinetic energy-energy dissipation (k-epsilon) model are solved numerically to simulate the flow through a cascade. The governing equations are solved for the entire flow domain, without the boundary layer assumptions. The stiffness of the k-epsilon equations is discussed. A semi-implicit, Runge-Kutta, time-marching scheme is developed to solve the k-epsilon equations. The impact of the k-epsilon solver on the explicit Runge-Kutta Navier-Stokes solver is discussed. Numerical solutions are presented for two dimensional turbulent flow over a flat plate and a double circular arc cascade and compared with experimental data.

Liu, Jong-Shang↗

Navier-Stokes cascade analysis with a stiff k-epsilon turbulence solver

The two dimensional, compressible, thin layer Navier-Stokes equations with the Baldwin-Lomax turbulence model and the kinetic energy-energy dissipation (k-epsilon) model are solved numerically to simulate the flow through a cascade. The governing equations are solved for the entire flow domain, without the boundary layer assumptions. The stiffness of the k-epsilon equations is discussed. A semi-implicit, Runge-Kutta, time-marching scheme is developed to solve the k-epsilon equations. The impact of the k-epsilon solver on the explicit Runge-Kutta Navier-Stokes solver is discussed. Numerical solutions are presented for two dimensional turbulent flow over a flat plate and a double circular arc cascade and compared with experimental data.

Liu, Jong-Shang↗

Design and performance of a fixed, nonaccelerating, guide vane cascade that operates over an inlet flow angle range of 60 deg

A unique set of wind tunnel guide vanes are designed with an inverse design code and analyzed with a panel method and an integral boundary layer code developed at the NASA Lewis Research Center. The fixed guide vanes, 80 feet long with 6-foot chord length, were designed for the NASA Ames 40 x 80/80 x 120 ft Wind Tunnel. Low subsonic flow is accepted over a 60 deg range of inlet angle from either the 40 x 80 leg or the 80 x 120 leg of the wind tunnel, and directed axially into the main leg of the tunnel where drive fans are located. Experimental tests of 1/10-scale models were conducted to verify design calculations.

Sanz, J. M.↗

Design and performance of a fixed, nonaccelerating guide vane cascade that operates over an inlet flow angle range of 60 deg

A unique set of wind tunnel guide vanes are designed with an inverse design code and analyzed with a panel method and an integral boundary layer code developed at the NASA Lewis Research Center. The fixed guide vanes, 80 feet long with 6-foot chord length, were designed for the NASA Ames 40 x 80/80 x 120 ft Wind Tunnel. Low subsonic flow is accepted over a 60 deg range of inlet angle from either the 40 x 80 leg or the 80 x 120 leg of the wind tunnel, and directed axially into the main leg of the tunnel where drive fans are located. Experimental tests of 1/10-scale models were conducted to verify design calculations.

Sanz, J. M.↗