Convex Curvature Effects on Film Cooling Adiabatic Effectiveness

Author(s):  
James R. Winka ◽  
Joshua B. Anderson ◽  
David G. Bogard ◽  
Michael E. Crawford ◽  
Emily J. Boyd

Surface curvature is known to have significant effects on film cooling performance, with convex curvature inducing increased film effectiveness and concave curvature causing decreased film effectiveness. Generally, these curvature effects have been presumed to scale with 2r/d at the film cooling hole location, where r is the radius of curvature and d is coolant hole diameter. In this study, the validity of this scaling of curvature effects are examined by performing experiments in regions of large and low curvature on a model vane. Single rows of cylindrical holes were placed at various locations along the high curvature section of the suction side of the vane. For the first series of experiments, a single row of holes was placed at two locations with different local surface curvature. The coolant hole diameters were then adjusted to match 2r/d values. Results from these experiments showed that there was better correspondence of film performance when using the 2r/d scaling, but there was not an exact matching of performance. A second series of experiments focused on evaluating the effects of curvature downstream of the coolant holes. One row of holes was placed at a position upstream of the highest curvature, while another row was placed at a downstream position such that the radius of curvature was equivalent for the two rows of holes. Results indicated that the local radius of curvature is not sufficient in understanding the performance of film cooling. Instead, the curvature envelope downstream of the coolant holes plays a significant role on the performance of film cooling for cylindrical holes.

2013 ◽  
Vol 136 (6) ◽  
Author(s):  
James R. Winka ◽  
Joshua B. Anderson ◽  
Emily J. Boyd ◽  
David G. Bogard ◽  
Michael E. Crawford

Surface curvature is known to have significant effects on film cooling performance, with convex curvature inducing increased film effectiveness and concave curvature causing decreased film effectiveness. Generally, these curvature effects have been presumed to scale with 2r/d at the film cooling hole location, where r is the radius of curvature and d is coolant hole diameter. In this study, the validity of this scaling of curvature effects are examined by performing experiments in regions of large and low curvature on a model vane. Single rows of cylindrical holes were placed at various locations along the high curvature section of the suction side of the vane. For the first series of experiments, a single row of holes was placed at two locations with different local surface curvature. The coolant hole diameters were then adjusted to match 2r/d values. Results from these experiments showed that there was better correspondence of film performance when using the 2r/d scaling, but there was not an exact matching of performance. A second series of experiments focused on evaluating the effects of curvature downstream of the coolant holes. One row of holes was placed at a position upstream of the highest curvature, while another row was placed at a downstream position such that the radius of curvature was equivalent for the two rows of holes. Results indicated that the local radius of curvature is not sufficient in understanding the performance of film cooling. Instead, the curvature envelope downstream of the coolant holes plays a significant role on the performance of film cooling for cylindrical holes.


2020 ◽  
Vol 142 (11) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jacob D. Moore ◽  
Christopher Yoon ◽  
David G. Bogard

Abstract Surface curvature has been shown to have significant effects on the film cooling performance of round holes, but the literature include few studies of its effects on shaped holes despite their prevalence in gas turbines. Experiments were performed using two rows of holes placed on the suction side of a scaled-up turbine blade in a low Mach number linear cascade wind tunnel with low freestream turbulence. The rows were placed in regions of high and low convex surface curvature. Geometries and flow conditions for the rows were matched to those from previous flat plate studies. Comparison of the adiabatic effectiveness results from the high curvature and flat plate rows revealed the same trends as those in the literature using round holes, with increased performance for the high curvature row at lower blowing ratios and the opposite at higher ones. The low curvature row had similar performance to the flat plate row at lower blowing ratios, suggesting the mild convex curvature had little beneficial effect. At higher blowing ratios, the low curvature row had inferior performance, which was attributed to the local freestream adverse pressure gradient that generated additional turbulence, promoting jet-to-mainstream mixing and decreasing performance.


Author(s):  
John R. Dorrington ◽  
David G. Bogard ◽  
Ronald S. Bunker

Film cooling adiabatic effectiveness was investigated for various configurations of coolant holes embedded in shallow transverse trenches or circular and elliptical shaped depressions. As a basis of comparison, a shaped hole configuration was also tested. Tests were conducted on the suction side of a simulated vane at a downstream location where pressure gradient and curvature effects were small. For the transverse trench, effects of the trench width with varying depths, the trench wall angle, and the pitch between holes within the trench were investigated with trench depths that ranged from 0.5d to 1d. The crater depressions were tested at a depth of 0.5d. The film effectiveness for the crater depressions was not as good as the best performing trench configuration at that depth, but they all performed better than the baseline configuration of cylindrical holes. The trench configurations were found to have an optimum depth of 0.75d, with little improvement in performance for trench depths greater than this. Comparison of the trench performance with a typical shaped hole configuration showed that film effectiveness for the trench was similar to that of the shaped holes.


Author(s):  
Jacob D. Moore ◽  
Christopher Yoon ◽  
David G. Bogard

Abstract Surface curvature has been shown to have significant effects on the film cooling performance of round holes, but the literature includes few studies of its effects on shaped holes despite their prevalence in gas turbines. Experiments were performed using two rows of holes placed on the suction side of a scaled-up turbine blade in a low-Mach-number linear cascade wind tunnel with low freestream turbulence. The rows were placed in regions of high and low convex surface curvature, respectively. Geometries and flow conditions for the rows were matched to those from previous flat plate studies. Comparison of the adiabatic effectiveness results from the high curvature and flat plate rows revealed the same trends as those in the literature using round holes — with increased performance for the high curvature row at lower blowing ratios and the opposite at higher ones. The low curvature row had similar performance to the flat plate row at lower blowing ratios, suggesting the mild convex curvature had little beneficial effect. At higher blowing ratios, the low curvature row had inferior performance, which was attributed to the local freestream adverse pressure gradient that generated additional turbulence, promoting jet-to-mainstream mixing and decreasing performance.


2015 ◽  
Vol 137 (9) ◽  
Author(s):  
Hossein Nadali Najafabadi ◽  
Matts Karlsson ◽  
Mats Kinell ◽  
Esa Utriainen

In this paper, the transient IR-thermography method is used to investigate the effect of showerhead cooling on the film-cooling performance of the suction side of a turbine guide vane working under engine-representative conditions. The resulting adiabatic film effectiveness, heat transfer coefficient (HTC) augmentation, and net heat flux reduction (NHFR) due to insertion of rows of cooling holes at two different locations in the presence and absence of the showerhead cooling are presented. One row of cooling holes is located in the relatively high convex surface curvature region, while the other is situated closer to the maximum throat velocity. In the latter case, a double staggered row of fan-shaped cooling holes has been considered for cross-comparison with the single row at the same position. Both cylindrical and fan-shaped holes have been examined, where the characteristics of fan-shaped holes are based on design constraints for medium size gas turbines. The blowing rates tested are 0.6, 0.9, and 1.2 for single and double cooling rows, whereas the showerhead blowing is maintained at constant nominal blowing rate. The adiabatic film effectiveness results indicate that most noticable effects from the showerhead can be seen for the cooling row located on the higher convex surface curvature. This observation holds for both cylindrical and fan-shaped holes. These findings suggest that while the showerhead blowing does not have much impact on this cooling row from HTC enhancement perspective, it is influential in determination of the HTC augmentation for the cooling row close to the maximum throat velocity. The double-row fan-shaped cooling seems to be less affected by an upstream showerhead blowing when considering HTC enhancement, but it makes a major contribution in defining adiabatic film effectiveness. The NHFR results highlight the fact that cylindrical holes are not significantly affected by the showerhead cooling regardless of their position, but showerhead blowing can play an important role in determining the overall film-cooling performance of fan-shaped holes (for both the cooling row located on the higher convex surface curvature and the cooling row close to the maximum throat velocity), for both the single and the double row cases.


Author(s):  
Yoji Okita ◽  
Chiyuki Nakamata

This paper presents results of a computational study for the endwall film cooling of an annular nozzle cascade employing a circumferentially asymmetric contoured passage. The investigated geometrical parameters and the flow conditions are set consistent with a generic modern HP-turbine nozzle. Rows of cylindrical film cooling holes on the contoured endwall are arranged with a design practice for the ordinary axisymmetric endwall. The solution domain, which includes the mainflow, cooling hole paths, and the coolant plenum, is discretized in the RANS equations with the realizable k-epsilon model. The calculated flow field shows that the pressure gradients across the passage between the pressure and the suction side are reduced with the asymmetric endwall, and consequently, the rolling up of the inlet boundary layer into the passage vortex is delayed and the separation line has moved further downstream. With the asymmetric endwall, because of the effective suppression of the secondary flow, more uniform film coverage is achieved especially in the rear part of the passage and the laterally averaged effectiveness is also significantly improved in this region. The closer inspection of the calculated thermal field reveals that, with the asymmetric passage, the coolant ejected from the holes are less deflected by the secondary vortices, and it attaches better to the endwall in this rear part.


Author(s):  
Rui Zhu ◽  
Gongnan Xie ◽  
Terrence W. Simon

Secondary holes to a main film cooling hole are used to improve film cooling performance by creating anti-kidney vortices. The effects of injection angle of the secondary holes on both film cooling effectiveness and surrounding thermal and flow fields are investigated in this numerical study. Two kinds of primary hole shapes are adopted. One is a cylindrical hole, the other is a horn-shaped hole which is designed from a cylindrical hole by expanding the hole in the transverse direction to double the hole size at the exit. Two smaller cylindrical holes, the secondary holes, are located symmetrically about the centerline and downstream of the primary hole. Three compound injection angles (α = 30°, 45° and 60°, β = 30°) of the secondary holes are analyzed while the injection angle of the primary hole is kept at 45°. Cases with various blowing ratios are computed. It is shown from the simulation that cooling effectiveness of secondary holes with a horn-shaped primary hole is better than that with a cylindrical primary hole, especially at high blowing ratios. With a cylindrical primary hole, increasing inclination angle of the secondary holes provides better cooling effectiveness because the anti-kidney vortices created by shallow secondary holes cannot counteract the kidney vortex pairs adequately, enhancing mixing of main flow and coolant. For secondary holes with a horn-shaped primary hole, large secondary hole inclination angles provide better cooling performance at low blowing ratios; but, at high blowing ratios, secondary holes with small inclination angles are more effective, as the film coverage becomes wider in the downstream area.


2008 ◽  
Vol 131 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ruwan P. Somawardhana ◽  
David G. Bogard

Recent studies have shown that film cooling with holes embedded in a shallow trench significantly improves cooling performance. In this study, the performance of shallow trench configurations was investigated for simulated deteriorated surface conditions, i.e., increased surface roughness and near-hole obstructions. Experiments were conducted on the suction side of a scaled-up simulated turbine vane. Results from the study indicated that as much as 50% degradation occurred with upstream obstructions, but downstream obstructions actually enhanced film cooling effectiveness. However, the transverse trench configuration performed significantly better than the traditional cylindrical holes, both with and without obstructions and almost eliminated the effects of both surface roughness and obstructions.


2008 ◽  
Vol 130 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Atul Kohli ◽  
David G. Bogard

In this study, a computational fluid dynamics (CFD)-based optimization process is used to change the contour of the airfoil near a suction-side cooling hole in order to improve its film effectiveness characteristics. An overview of the optimization process, which includes automated geometry, grid generation, and CFD analyses, is provided. From the results for the optimized geometry, it is clear that the detachment of the cooling jet is much reduced and the cooling jet spread in the spanwise direction is increased substantially. The new external contour was then tested in a low-speed wind tunnel to provide a direct measure of the predictive capability. Comparisons to verification test data indicate that good agreement was achieved for both pressure and film cooling effectiveness behavior. This study proves that despite its limitations, current Reynolds averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) methodology can be used a viable design tool and lead to innovative concepts for improving film cooling effectiveness.


2009 ◽  
Vol 131 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Zhihong Gao ◽  
Diganta Narzary ◽  
Je-Chin Han

This paper is focused on the effect of film-hole configurations on platform film cooling. The platform is cooled by purge flow from a simulated stator-rotor seal combined with discrete-hole film cooling within the blade passage. The cylindrical holes and laidback fan-shaped holes are assessed in terms of film-cooling effectiveness and total pressure loss. Lined up with the freestream streamwise direction, the film holes are arranged on the platform with two different layouts. In one layout, the film-cooling holes are divided into two rows and more concentrated on the pressure side of the passage. In the other layout, the film-cooling holes are divided into four rows and loosely distributed on the platform. Four film-cooling hole configurations are investigated totally. Testing was done in a five-blade cascade with medium high Mach number condition (0.27 and 0.44 at the inlet and the exit, respectively). The detailed film-cooling effectiveness distributions on the platform were obtained using pressure sensitive paint technique. Results show that the combined cooling scheme (slot purge flow cooling combined with discrete-hole film cooling) is able to provide full film coverage on the platform. The shaped holes present higher film-cooling effectiveness and wider film coverage than the cylindrical holes, particularly at higher blowing ratios. The hole layout affects the local film-cooling effectiveness. The shaped holes also show the advantage over the cylindrical holes with lower total pressure loss.


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