Similarity tests of turbine vanes - Effects of ceramic thermal barrier coatings
The role of material thermal conductivity was analyzed for its effect on the thermal performance of air-cooled gas turbine components coated with a ceramic thermal barrier material when tested at reduced temperatures and pressures. This study shows that the thermal performance can be evaluated reliably at reduced gas and coolant conditions. However, thermal conductivity corrections are required for the data at reduced conditions. These corrections for a ceramic thermal barrier coated vane are significantly different than the corrections for an uncoated vane. Comparison of uncorrected test data, therefore, would show erroneously that the thermal barrier coating was ineffective. When thermal conductivity corrections are applied to the test data these data are then shown to be representative of engine data and also show that the thermal barrier coating increases the vane cooling effectiveness by 12.5 precent.