Rotating tip clearance asymmetry and role of endwall injection in stability desensitization of a transonic fan

The current study is aimed at understanding the effect of rotating tip clearance asymmetry on the operability and performance of a transonic compressor. Another objective of this investigation is to determine the influence of tip injection on reducing the detrimental effects of clearance asymmetry. Three dimensional unsteady Reynolds-averaged Navier–stokes simulations have been performed from choke to stall for different arrangements of non-uniform blade heights in a transonic fan. Furthermore, numerical computations have been conducted with endwall injection of air. The numerical results have been validated against experimental data. Results show that having the same mean tip clearance, the asymmetric compressor is less stable than the axisymmetric configuration. However, the peak pressure rise is found to be almost linearly correlated to the mean tip clearance for both the axisymmetric and asymmetric compressors. It is found that tip injection can desensitize the compressor to the tip clearance asymmetry. Results further reveal that tip clearance asymmetry does not change the compressor path to instability. However, endwall injection is found to be able to change the compressor stalling mode. Investigations concerning rotating non-uniformity (caused by non-uniform blade heights) are very few in open literature. The obtained results can assist in predicting the effect of rotating tip clearance asymmetry on the stability and performance of high-speed compressor rotors. Furthermore, the results uncover how tip injection can desensitize the compressor stability and affect its path into instability, which is one of the most important questions in the turbomachinery world.

TRANSONIC RELIEF IN FANS AND COMPRESSORS

Every supersonic fan/compressor blade row has a streamtube, the ‘sonic streamtube’, which operates with a blade relative inlet Mach number of one. A key parameter in the design of the ‘sonic streamtube’ is the area ratio between the blade throat area and upstream passage area, Athroat/Ainlet. In this paper, it is shown that one unique value exists for this area ratio. If the area ratio differs, even slightly, from this unique value then the blade either chokes or has its suction surface boundary layer separated due to a strong shock. It is therefore surprising that in practice designers have relatively little problem designing blade sections with an inlet relative Mach number close to unity. This paper shows that this occurs due to a physical mechanism known as ‘transonic relief’. If a designer makes a mistake and designs a blade with a ‘sonic streamtube’ which has the wrong area ratio, then ‘transonic relief’, will self-adjust the spanwise streamtube height automatically moving it towards the unique optimal area ratio, correcting for the designer's error. Furthermore, as the blade incidence changes, the spanwise streamtube height self-adjusts, moving the area ratio towards its unique optimal value. Without ‘transonic relief’, supersonic or transonic fan/compressor design would be impossible. The paper develops a simple model which allows ‘transonic relief’ to be decoupled from other mechanisms, and to be systematically studied. The physical mechanism on which it is based is thus determined and its implications for blade design and manufacturing discussed.

Effect Of Manufacturing Tolerance In Flow Past A Compressor Blade

This paper presents the effect of manufacturing tolerance on performance and stability boundaries of a transonic fan using a RANS simulation. The effect of tip gap and stagger angle was analysed through a series of single passage and double passage simulation; based on which an optimal arrangement was proposed for random tip gap and random stagger angle in case of a whole annulus rotor. All simulations were carried out using NASA rotor 67 as a test case and AU3D an in-house CFD solver. Results illustrate that the stagger angle mainly affects efficiency and hence its circumferential variation must be as smooth as possible. Furthermore, the tip gap affects the stability boundaries, pressure ratio and efficiency. Hence its optimal configuration mandates that the blades be configured in a zigzag arrangement around the annulus i.e. larger tip gap between two smaller ones.

Global Optimisation of a Transonic Fan Blade Through AI-Enabled Active Subspaces

The increased need to design higher performing aerodynamic shapes has led to design optimisation cycles requiring high-fidelity CFD models and high-dimensional parametrisation schemes. The computational cost of employing global search algorithms on such scenarios has typically been prohibitive for most academic and industrial environments. In this paper, a novel strategy is presented that leverages the capabilities of Artificial Neural Networks for regressing complex unstructured data, while coupling them with dimensionality reduction algorithms. This approach enables employing global-based optimisation methods on high-dimensional applications through a reduced computational cost. This methodology is demonstrated on the efficiency optimisation of a modern jet engine fan blade with constrained pressure ratio. The outcome is compared against a state-of-the-art adjoint-based approach. Results indicate the strategy proposed achieves comparable improvements to its adjoint counterpart with a reduced computational cost, and can scale better to multi-objective optimisation applications.