Study of Internal Flows in a Mixed-Flow Pump Impeller at Various Tip Clearances Using Three-Dimensional Viscous Flow Computations

1992 ◽  
Vol 114 (2) ◽  
pp. 373-382 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. Goto

The complex three-dimensional flow fields in a mixed-flow pump impeller are investigated by applying the incompressible version of Dawes’ Three-Dimensional Navier–Stokes code. The applicability of the code is confirmed by comparison of computations with a variety of experimentally measured jet-wake flow patterns and overall performances at four different tip clearances, including the shrouded case. Based on the computations, the interaction mechanism of secondary flows and the formation of jet-wake flow are discussed. In the case of large tip clearances, the reverse flow caused by tip leakage flow is considered to be the reason for the thickening of the casing boundary layer followed by the deterioration of the whole flow field.

Author(s):  
Akira Goto

The complex three-dimensional flow fields in a mixed-flow pump impeller are investigated by applying the incompressible version of the Dawes’ 3D Navier-Stokes code. The applicability of the code is confirmed by comparison of computations with a variety of experimentally measured jet-wake flow patterns and overall performances at four different tip clearances including the shrouded case. Based on the computations, the interaction mechanism of secondary flows and the formation of jet-wake flow are discussed. In the case of large tip clearances, the reverse flow caused by tip leakage flow is considered to be the reason for the thickening of the casing boundary layer followed by the deterioration of the whole flow field.


1996 ◽  
Vol 118 (3) ◽  
pp. 544-551 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. Goto ◽  
T. Takemura ◽  
M. Zangeneh

In Part 1 of this paper, a mixed-flow pump impeller was designed by a fully three-dimensional inverse design method, aimed at suppressing the secondary flows on the blade suction surface. In this part, the internal flow fields of the impeller are investigated experimentally, using flow visualization and phase-locked measurements of the impeller exit flow, in order to validate the effects of secondary flow suppression. The flow fields are compared with those of a conventional impeller, and it is confirmed that the secondary flows on the blade suction surface are well suppressed and the uniformity of the exit flow fields is improved substantially, in both circumferential and spanwise directions. The effects of tip clearance and the number of blades for the inverse designed impeller are also investigated experimentally and numerically.


1996 ◽  
Vol 118 (3) ◽  
pp. 536-543 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Zangeneh ◽  
A. Goto ◽  
T. Takemura

This paper describes the design of the blade geometry of a medium specific speed mixed flow pump impeller by using a three-dimensional inverse design method in which the blade circulation (or rVθ) is specified. The design objective is the reduction of impeller exit flow nonuniformity by reducing the secondary flows on the blade suction surface. The paper describes in detail the aerodynamic criteria used for the suppression of secondary flows with reference to the loading distribution and blade stacking condition used in the design. The flow through the designed impeller is computed by Dawes’ viscous code, which indicates that the secondary flows are well suppressed on the suction surface. Comparison between the predicted exit flow field of the inverse designed impeller and a corresponding conventional impeller indicates that the suppression of secondary flows has resulted in substantial improvement in the exit flow field. Experimental comparison of the flow fields inside and at exit from the conventional and the inverse designed impeller is made in Part 2 of the paper.


Author(s):  
J. Luo ◽  
B. Lakshminarayana

The 3-D viscous flowfield in the rotor passage of a single-stage turbine, including the tip-leakage flow, is computed using a Navier-Stokes procedure. A grid-generation code has been developed to obtain embedded H grids inside the rotor tip gap. The blade tip geometry is accurately modeled without any “pinching”. Chien’s low-Reynolds-number k-ε model is employed for turbulence closure. Both the mean-flow and turbulence transport equations are integrated in time using a four-stage Runge-Kutta scheme. The computational results for the entire turbine rotor flow, particularly the tip-leakage flow and the secondary flows, are interpreted and compared with available data. The predictions for major features of the flowfield are found to be in good agreement with the data. Complicated interactions between the tip-clearance flows and the secondary flows are examined in detail. The effects of endwall rotation on the development and interaction of secondary and tip-leakage vortices are also analyzed.


1993 ◽  
Author(s):  
Akira Goto

An active method for enhancing pump stability, featuring water jet injection at impeller inlet, was applied to a mixed-flow pump. The stall margin, between the design point and the positive slope region of the head-flow characteristic, was most effectively enlarged by injecting the jet in the counter-rotating direction of the impeller. The counter-rotating streamwise vorticity along the casing, generated by the velocity discontinuity due to the jet injection, altered the secondary flow pattern in the impeller by opposing the passage vortex and assisting the tip leakage vortex motion. The location of the wake flow was displaced away from the casing-suction surface corner of the impeller, thus avoiding the onset of the extensive corner separation, the cause of positive slope region of the head-flow characteristic. This method was also confirmed to be effective for stabilizing a pump system already in a state of surge.


Author(s):  
Hyeonmo Yang ◽  
Sung Kim ◽  
Kyoung-Yong Lee ◽  
Young-Seok Choi ◽  
Jin-Hyuk Kim

One of the best examples of wasted energy is the selection of oversized pumps versus the rated conditions. Oversized pumps are forced to operate at reduced flows, far from their highest efficiency point. An unnecessarily large impeller will produce more flow than required, wasting energy. In the industrial field, trimming the impeller diameter is used more than changing the rotation speed to reduce the head of a pump. In this paper, the impeller trimming method of a mixed-flow pump is defined, and the variation in pump performance by reduction of the impeller diameter was predicted based on computational fluid dynamics. The impeller was trimmed to the same meridional ratio of the hub and shroud, and was compared in five cases. Numerical analysis was performed, including the inlet and outlet pipes in configurations of the mixed-flow pump to be tested. The commercial CFD code, ANSYS CFX-14.5, was used for the numerical analysis, and a three-dimensional Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes equations with a shear stress transport turbulence model were used to analyze incompressible turbulence flow. The performance parameters for evaluating the trimmed pump impellers were defined as the total efficiency and total head at the designed flow rate. The numerical and experimental results for the trimmed pump impellers were compared and discussed in this work.


Author(s):  
S M Fraser ◽  
Y Zhang

Three-dimensional turbulent flow through the impeller passage of a model mixed-flow pump has been simulated by solving the Navier-Stokes equations with an improved κ-ɛ model. The standard κ-ɛ model was found to be unsatisfactory for solving the off-design impeller flow and a converged solution could not be obtained at 49 per cent design flowrate. After careful analysis, it was decided to modify the standard κ-ɛ model by including the extra rates of strain due to the acceleration of impeller rotation and geometrical curvature and removing the mathematical ill-posedness between the mean flow turbulence modelling and the logarithmic wall function.


1992 ◽  
Author(s):  
K. R. Kirtley ◽  
T. A. Beach ◽  
Cass Rogo

A numerical simulation of a transonic mixed flow turbine stage has been carried out using an average passage Navier-Stokes analysis. The mixed flow turbine stage considered here consists of a transonic nozzle vane and a highly loaded rotor. The simulation was run at the design pressure ratio and is assessed by comparing results with those of an established throughflow design system. The three-dimensional aerodynamic loads are studied as well as the development and migration of secondary flows and their contribution to the total pressure loss. The numerical results indicate that strong passage vortices develop in the nozzle vane, mix out quickly, and have little impact on the rotor flow. The rotor is highly loaded near the leading edge. Within the rotor passage, strong spanwise flows and other secondary flows exist along with the tip leakage vortex. The rotor exit loss distribution is similar in character to that found in radial inflow turbines. The secondary flows and non-uniform work extraction also tend to significantly redistribute a non-uniform inlet total temperature profile by the exit of the stage.


Author(s):  
C. Cravero ◽  
A. Satta ◽  
M. Marini

A CFD method, previously developed by the authors for compressible flows, has been modified through a preconditioning technique to account for purely incompressible flows. Such a code is used to compute three-dimensional flows in a mixed flow pump impeller at design and off-design conditions. The results of the inviscid flow approach are critically discussed by comparison to available experimental data.


Author(s):  
M. Zangeneh-Kazemi ◽  
W. N. Dawes ◽  
W. R. Hawthorne

The flow through an impeller of a low speed radial-inflow turbine has been analysed using a fully three-dimensional viscous program and good correlations with instantaneous measurements of casing static pressure and exit flow distribution have been obtained. The flow at the exit of the turbine shows a pronounced non-uniformity with a wake region of high absolute flow angle near the casing. The predictions show that the flow is fully attached inside the impeller, while secondary flows can be observed especially in the exducer moving low momentum fluid towards the casing-suction corner. The presence of these secondary flows is discussed with reference to classical secondary flow theory. However, the comparison of measurements and numerical predictions indicate that the wake flow pattern is only partly due to the secondary flow. It is shown that in fact the tip leakage flow also plays a significant role in the wake generation and correspondingly some modelling of the leakage flow is essential in any attempted numerical simulations.


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