Multidisciplinary Assessment of the Control of the Propellers of a Pusher Geared Open Rotor—Part I: Zero-Dimensional Performance Model for Counter-Rotating Propellers

Author(s):  
Pablo Bellocq ◽  
Inaki Garmendia ◽  
Vishal Sethi ◽  
Alexis Patin ◽  
Stefano Capodanno ◽  
...  

Due to their high propulsive efficiency, counter-rotating open rotors (CRORs) have the potential to significantly reduce fuel consumption and emissions relative to conventional high bypass ratio turbofans. However, this novel engine architecture presents many design and operational challenges both at engine and aircraft level. The assessment of the impact of the main low-pressure preliminary design and control parameters of CRORs on mission fuel burn, certification noise, and emissions is necessary at preliminary design stages in order to identify optimum design regions. These assessments may also aid the development process when compromises need to be performed as a consequence of design, operational, or regulatory constraints. The required preliminary design simulation tools should ideally be 0D or 1D (for computational purposes) and should capture the impact of the independent variation of the main low-pressure system design and control variables, such as the number of blades, diameter and rotational speed of each propeller, the spacing between the propellers, and the torque ratio (TR) of the gearbox or the counter-rotating turbine (CRT), among others. From a performance point of view, counter-rotating propellers (CRPs) have historically been modeled as single propellers. Such a performance model does not provide the required flexibility for a detailed design and control study. Part I of this two-part publication presents a novel 0D performance model for CRPs allowing an independent definition of the design and operation of each of the propellers. It is based on the classical low-speed performance model for individual propellers, the interactions between them, and a compressibility correction which is applied to both propellers. The proposed model was verified with publicly available wind tunnel test data from NASA and was judged to be suitable for preliminary design studies of geared and direct drive open rotors. The model has to be further verified with high-speed wind tunnel test data of highly loaded propellers, which was not found in the public domain. In Part II, the novel CRP model is used to produce a performance model of a geared open rotor (GOR) engine with a 10% clipped propeller designed for a 160 PAX and 5700 NM aircraft. This engine model is first used to study the impact of the control of the propellers on the engine specific fuel consumption (SFC). Subsequently, it was integrated in a multidisciplinary simulation platform to study the impact of the control of the propellers on engine weight, certification noise, and NOx emission.

Author(s):  
Pablo Bellocq ◽  
Vishal Sethi ◽  
Stefano Capodanno ◽  
Alexis Patin ◽  
Fernando Rodriguez Lucas

Due to their high propulsive efficiency, Counter Rotating Open Rotors (CRORs) have the potential to significantly reduce fuel consumption and emissions relative to conventional high bypass ratio turbofans. However, this novel engine architecture presents many design and operational challenges both at engine and aircraft level. The assessment of the impact of the main low pressure preliminary design and control parameters of CRORs on mission fuel burn, certification noise and emissions is necessary at preliminary design stages in order to identify optimum design regions. These assessments may also aid the development process when compromises need to be performed as a consequence of design, operational or regulatory constraints. The required preliminary design simulation tools should ideally be 0-D or 1-D (for computational purposes) and should capture the impact of the independent variation of the main low pressure system design and control variables such as: the number of blades, diameter and rotational speed of each propeller, the spacing between the propellers and the torque ratio of the gearbox or the counter rotating turbine amongst others. From a performance point of view, counter rotating propellers have historically been modelled as single propellers. Such a performance model does not provide the required flexibility for a detailed design and control study. This paper presents a novel 0-D performance model for Counter Rotating Propellers (CRPs) based on the classical low speed performance model for individual propellers and the interactions between them. This model also incorporates a compressibility correction which is applied to both propellers. The proposed model is verified with publicly available wind tunnel test data from NASA. The novel 0-D counter rotating propeller performance model is used to produce a performance model of a geared Open Rotor engine with a 10% clipped propeller. This engine model is first used to study the impact of the control of the propellers on the cruise fuel consumption. Subsequently, the engine performance model is integrated in a multi-disciplinary simulation platform to study the impact of the control of the propellers on the certification noise. The results of this case study show that 1–2% SFC savings at cruise are possible and an optimal control schedule is identified. It is also concluded that significant certification noise reductions are possible through an adequate control of the rotational speeds of the propellers.


Author(s):  
Pablo Bellocq ◽  
Inaki Garmendia ◽  
Vishal Sethi ◽  
Alexis Patin ◽  
Stefano Capodanno ◽  
...  

Due to their high propulsive efficiency, counter-rotating open rotors (CRORs) have the potential to significantly reduce fuel consumption and emissions relative to conventional high bypass ratio turbofans. However, this novel engine architecture presents many design and operational challenges both at engine and aircraft level. The assessment of the impact of the main low-pressure preliminary design and control parameters of CRORs on mission fuel burn, certification noise, and emissions is necessary at preliminary design stages in order to identify optimum design regions. These assessments may also aid the development process when compromises need to be performed as a consequence of design, operational, or regulatory constraints. Part I of this two-part publication presents a novel 0D performance model for counter-rotating propellers (CRPs) allowing an independent definition of the design and operation of each of the propellers. In Part II, the novel CRP model is used to create an engine performance model of a geared open rotor (GOR). This engine model is integrated in a multidisciplinary simulation platform which was used to assess the impact of the control of the propellers, on specific fuel consumption (SFC), engine weight, certification noise, and NOx emission, for a GOR with a 10% clipped rear propeller designed for a 160 PAX and 5700 NM aircraft. The main conclusions of the study are: (1) Minimum SFC control schedules were identified for climb, cruise, and descent (high-rotational speeds for high thrust and low-rotational speeds for low thrust), (2) SFC reductions up to 2% in cruise and 23% in descent can be achieved by using the minimum SFC control. However, the relatively high SFC reductions in descent SFC result in ∼3.5% fuel saving for a 500 NM and ∼0.7% fuel saving for a full range mission, (3) at least 2–3 dB noise reductions for both sideline and flyover can be achieved by reducing the rotational speeds of the propellers at a cost of ∼6% increase of landing and takeoff cycle (LTO) NOx and 10 K increase in turbine entry temperature, (4) approach noise can be reduced by at least 2 dB by reducing CRP rotational speeds with an associated reduction of ∼0.6% in LTO NOx, and (5) the control of the CRP at takeoff has a large impact on differential planetary gearbox (DPGB) weight, but it is almost identical in magnitude and opposite to the change in low-pressure turbine (LPT) and CRP weight. Consequently, the control of the CRP at takeoff has a negligible impact in overall engine weight.


Author(s):  
Nhu Van Nguyen ◽  
Maxim Tyan ◽  
Jae-Woo Lee ◽  
Sangho Kim

The stability and control characteristics using a wind tunnel test data process are proposed and developed to investigate the stability and control characteristics of a CS-VLA certified aircraft and to comply with the CS-VLA subpart B at the preliminary design review (PDR) and critical design review (CDR) stage. The aerodynamic characteristics of a 20% scale model are provided and investigated with clean, rudder, aileron, elevator, and winglet effects. The Mach and Reynolds correction methods are proposed to correct the aerodynamics of the scale model for stability and control analysis to obtain more reliable and accurate results of the full-scale model. The aerodynamic inputs and moment of inertia (MOI) comparison between the PDR and CDR stage show good agreement in the trends of stability and control derivatives. The CDR analysis results with the corrected wind tunnel test data and accurate MOI are investigated with respect to the longitudinal and lateral stability, control, and handling qualities to comply with the CS-VLA 173, CS-VLA 177, and CS-VLA 181 for finalizing the configuration in the CDR stage.


Author(s):  
Daniel Barcarolo ◽  
Yann Andrillon ◽  
Erwan Jacquin ◽  
Alain Ledoux

The accurate evaluation of wind loads applied on floating offshore structures is extremely important as they are in specific conditions one of the dimensioning criteria for the mooring design. Nowadays these loads are mainly assessed through wind tunnel tests performed at model scale. Estimating realistic wind loads however, remains a big challenge. The complexity and associated simplification level of FPSO topside structures, the scale effects and the establishment of the atmospheric boundary layer imply that many simplifications are to be made. Typically, the FPSO topside is greatly simplified and equivalent blocs of wired frame are used. Today with the evolution of CFD software, and the increase of the meshing capacity, new scopes open to CFD. Aerodynamic simulations on complex FPSO structures are therefore now possible, but need specific developments and validations that are presented in this paper. The main objective of the work presented is to investigate the ability of CFD to evaluate wind loads on complex FPSOs topsides and to provide information on the impact of model simplifications made in wind tunnels. In a first stage, the numerical model was intensively validated by comparing its results to a wind tunnel test case. The numerical model was developed in order to ensure the quality of the results and enable a relevant comparison that was obtained with grids density up to 30 million cells. For this purpose, the geometric model used corresponds to the one used in wind tunnel. The same Atmospheric Boundary Layer was simulated and a thorough effort was performed to ensure the mesh convergence. In a second stage, more physical aspects of the wind tunnel methodology were investigated. Typically the accuracy of the blockage effect correction was evaluated by performing computations with and without blockage, and results were compared with classical corrections applied in wind tunnel. The impacts of the Atmospheric Boundary Layer on wind loads have also been investigated. Finally, the wind load contribution of each component of the FPSO was evaluated.


Author(s):  
O. Eisele ◽  
G. Pechlivanoglou ◽  
C. N. Nayeri ◽  
C. O. Paschereit

Wind turbine blade design is currently based on the combination of a plurality of airfoil sections along the rotorblade span. The two-dimensional airfoil characteristics are usually measured with wind tunnel experiments or computed by means of numerical simulation codes. The general airfoil input for the calculation of the rotorblade power characteristics as well as the subsequent aerodynamic and aeroelastic loads are based on these two-dimensional airfoil characteristics. In this paper, the effects of inflow turbulence and wind tunnel test measurement deviations are investigated and discussed, to allow considerations of such effects in the rotorblade design process. The results of CFD simulations with various turbulence models are utilized in combination with wind tunnel measurements in order to assess the impact of such discrepancies. It seems that turbulence, airfoil surface roughness and early transition effects are able to contribute significantly to the uncertainty and scattering of measurements. Various wind tunnel facilities generate different performance characteristic curves, while grid-generated turbulence is generally not included in the wind tunnel measurements during airfoil characterization. Furthermore the correlation of grid-generated wind tunnel turbulence with the atmospheric turbulence time and length scales is not easily achieved. All the aforementioned uncertainties can increase the performance scattering of current wind turbine blade designs as well as the generated aeroelastic loads. A brief assessment of the effect of such uncertainties on wind turbine performance is given at the last part of this work by means of BEM simulations on a wind turbine blade.


2015 ◽  
Vol 79 ◽  
pp. 227-235 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jaeha Ryi ◽  
Wook Rhee ◽  
Ui Chang Hwang ◽  
Jong-Soo Choi

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