Investigations on Aerodynamic Loading Limits of Subsonic Compressor Tandem Cascades: Midspan Flow

An optimized subsonic compressor tandem cascade was investigated experimentally and numerically. Since the design aims at incompressible applications, a low inlet Mach number of 0.175 was used. The experiments were carried out at the low speed cascade wind tunnel at the Technische Universität Braunschweig. For the numerical simulations, the CFD-solver TRACE of DLR Cologne was used, together with a curvature corrected k-ω turbulence model and the γ-Reθ transition model. Besides the incidence variation, the aerodynamic loading has also been varied by contracting endwalls. Results are presented and discussed for different inlet angles and endwall contractions: pressure distribution, loss coefficient, turning, pressure rise, AVDR and Mach number. The comparison of experimental and numerical results is always adequate for a large range of incidence. In addition, a comparison is made to an existing high subsonic tandem cascade and conventional cascades. For the latter the Lieblein diffusion factor has been employed as a measure of aerodynamic loading to complete the Lieblein Chart of McGlumphy [1].

Thermal-Structural Design of Actively-Cooled Panels Reinforced by Light-Weight Truss Cores

This paper focuses on thermal-structural analysis and lightweight design of actively-cooled panels reinforced by low density lattice-framed material (LFM) truss cores. Numerical models for actively-cooled panels are built up with parametric codes to perform the coupled thermal-structural analysis, considering the internal thermal environment of convective heat transfer in the combustor and convective heat transfer in the cooling channel, and internal pressures from the combustion gas and the coolant. A preliminary comparison of the LFM truss reinforced actively-cooled panel and the non-reinforced panel demonstrates that the thermal-structural behavior is significantly improved. Then, an optimization procedure is carried out to find the lightest design while satisfying thermal deformation and plastic strain constraints, with thicknesses of face sheets and topology parameters of LFM truss as design variables. The optimization result demonstrates that, compared with the non-reinforced actively-cooled panels, weight reduction for the panel reinforced by LFM truss may reach 19.6%. We have also fabricated this type of actively-cooled panel in the laboratory level, and the specimen shows good mechanical behaviors.

A Study on the Effect of Bird Hit Damage on the Dynamic Response of Aero-Engine Fan Blade

Fan blades of an aero-engine assembly are the critical components that are subjected to Foreign Object Damage (FOD) such as bird impact. Bird impact resulting in deformation damage onto set of blades, which in turn alters the blade mass and stiffness distribution compared to undamaged blades. This paper presents the numerical evaluation of dynamic characteristics of bird impact damaged blades. The dynamic characteristics evaluated are the natural frequencies and mode shapes of post impact damaged set of blades and the results are compared with undamaged set of blades. The frequencies and mode shapes are evaluated for the damaged blades, with varying angles of bird impact and three blade rotational speeds. Study reveals that first bending and torsional frequencies of deformed blades are significantly affected compared to undamaged set of blades. Study emphasize the need to evaluate the natural frequencies deformed blades, that has direct bearing on High Cycle Fatigue (HCF) life of the blade, to ensure post damaged blades operate safely for certain time to reduce inflight accidents and safe landing.

Aircraft Fleet Maintenance Planning Using Combined Cost Benefit Model and Branch and Bound

The tasks of maintenance and repair without optimal planning can be costly and result in prolonged maintenance times, reduced availability and possible flight delays. Aircraft manufacturers and maintainers see significant benefits in constantly improving Health Management and Maintenance (HMM) practices by deploying the most effective maintenance planning strategies. The planning of the maintenance and repair is a complex task due to chain dependency of engines to aircraft, and aircraft to the flight schedules. This paper presents a scheduling method for determining the time of maintenance based on the historical engine operation data in order to maximize the use of estimated remaining useful life of the engines as well as lowering the cost and duration of the downtime. The Time-on-Wing (TOW) data is used in conjunction with probability density functions to determine the shape of the respective distribution of the time of maintenance to minimize the loss of expected remaining useful life. Data from each engine with most chance of failure is then selected and fed into an extended Branch and Bound (B&B) routine to determine the best optimum sequence for entering the facility in order to minimize the waiting time.

The Effect of Heat Transfer Coefficient Increase on Tip Clearance Control in H.P. Compressors in Gas Turbine Engine

Compressor tip clearance for a gas turbine engine application is the radial gap between the stationary compressor casing and the rotating blades. The gap varies significantly during different operating conditions of the engine due to centrifugal forces on the rotor and differential thermal expansions in the discs and casing. The tip clearance in the axial flow compressor of modern commercial civil aero-engines is of significance in terms of both mechanical integrity and performance. In general, the clearance is of critical importance to civil airline operators and their customers alike because as the clearance between the compressor blade tips and the casing increases, the aerodynamic efficiency will decrease and therefore the specific fuel consumption and operating costs will increase. This paper reports on the development of a range of concepts and their evaluation for the reduction and control of tip clearance in H.P. compressors using an enhanced heat transfer coefficient approach. This would lead to improvement in cruise tip clearances. A test facility has been developed for the study at the University of Sussex, incorporating a rotor and an inner shaft scaled down from a Rolls-Royce Trent aero-engine to a ratio of 0.7:1 with a rotational speed of up to 10000 rpm. The idle and maximum take-off conditions in the square cycle correspond to in-cavity rotational Reynolds numbers of 3.1×106 ≤ Reφ ≤ 1.0×107. The project involved modelling of the experimental facilities, to demonstrate proof of concept. The analysis shows that increasing the thermal response of the high pressure compressor (HPC) drum of a gas turbine engine assembly will reduce the drum time constant, thereby reducing the re-slam characteristics of the drum causing a reduction in the cold build clearance (CBC), and hence the reduction in cruise clearance. A further reduction can be achieved by introducing radial inflow into the drum cavity to further increase the disc heat transfer coefficient in the cavity; hence a further reduction in disc drum time constant.

Numerical Investigation of Flow Over an Airfoil by the Lattice Boltzmann Method

During the last years the aerodynamics characteristics of airfoils have been studied solving numerically the Navier-Stokes (NS) equations. These calculations require a significant computational cost due to both the second order and the nonlinear characteristics of the NS partial differential equations. Therefore, efforts have been devoted to reduce this cost and increase the accuracy of the numerical methods. The Lattice-Boltzmann Method (LBM) has become a great alternative to simulate this problem and a variety of fluid flows. In this method, the convective operator is linear and the pressure is calculated directly by the equation of state without implementing iterative methods. This work represents a preliminary investigation of a laminar flow over airfoils under low Reynolds number conditions (Re = 500). Solutions are obtained using a Multi-Block mesh refinement method. In order to validate the computational code, calculations are performed on a SD7003 airfoil at an angle of attack of 4° and 30°, which corresponds to the available numerical and experimental results. The results of this study agree well with previous experimental and numerical studies demonstrating the capabilities of the LBM to simulate accurately laminar flows over airfoils as well as capturing and predicting the laminar separation bubbles.

Static and Dynamic Analysis of Aircraft Structures by Component-Wise Approach

This paper proposes an advanced approach to the analysis of reinforced-shell aircraft structures. This approach, denoted as Component-Wise (CW), is developed by using the Carrera Unified Formulation (CUF). CUF is a hierarchical formulation allowing for the straightforward implementation of any-order one-dimensional (1D) beam theories. Lagrange-like polynomials are used to discretize the displacement field on the cross-section of each component of the structure. Depending on the geometrical and material characteristics of the component, the capabilities of the model can be enhanced and the computational costs can be kept low through smart discretization strategies. The global mathematical model of complex structures (e.g. wings or fuselages) is obtained by assembling each component model at the cross-section level. Next, a classical 1D finite element (FE) formulation is used to develop numerical applications. It is shown that MSC/PATRAN can be used as pre- and post-processor for the CW models, whereas MSC/NASTRAN DMAP alters can be used to solve both static and dynamic problems. A number of typical aeronautical structures are analyzed and CW results are compared to classical beam theories (Euler-Bernoulli and Timoshenko), refined models and classical solid/shell FE solutions from the commercial code MSC/NASTRAN. The results highlight the enhanced capabilities of the proposed formulation. In fact, the CW approach is clearly the natural tool to analyze wing structures, since it leads to results that can be only obtained through three-dimensional elasticity (solid) elements whose computational costs are at least one-order of magnitude higher than CW models.

Research on Sealing Structure and Ground Test of Lunar Sample Return Devices

This article is in the background of lunar exploration program, which requires unmanned operation in the environment of ultra high vacuum, extreme temperature, strong radiation and lunar dust. Seal reliability of lunar sample return devices should be guaranteed as well. Principal prototype devices of explosive welding seal and brazing seal are analyzed separately when applied to lunar program, both of their advantages and disadvantages are indicated, and improved schemes are given as well. Besides, a redundant seal combined with o type rubber ring and knife edge indium alloy is put forward, to validate its reliability, a mathematical model based on Roth theory has been developed to describe sealing mechanism and predict the variable leakage, and the ground tests on leak detection for rubber seal and knife edge seal have been set up separately through helium mass spectrometer. According to the test results, nitrile rubber is proved to be better because of its resilience in alternative temperature, lower leakage and permeation. The knife edge indium seal has lower leak rate, and the welding joint quality of indium alloy itself can be guaranteed as well. The redundant seal is considered to have preliminary feasibility while the test environment for leak detection is required to simulate lunar surface still further.

Non-Destructive Evaluation of Composite Adhesive Kissing Bond

Adhesive bonded joints have been increasingly employed in aerospace, automotive, and other mechanical systems due to the advantages of uniform stress distribution, less stress concentration, light in weight, etc. However, the early damage stage of the adhesive bond joints, which are usually named as kissing bond, can significantly impact the structural integrity and safety. Kissing bond is difficult to detect and identify using current non-destructive evaluation (NDE) techniques since there is no clearly gap or interface between the bond area. Attempts using advanced ultrasonic methods have reached limited success, but more reliable methods need to be developed before adhesive joints can be more widely applied to the engineering field. This paper focuses on the development of detection method using digital image correlation (DIC) technique. Three types of adhesive kissing bond joint samples were fabricated using different contamination recipe to simulate the kissing bonds. The performance of the fabricated joint samples were tested using uniaxial hydraulic test frame and the detection capability of DIC system was investigated. The noncontact strain field measurement method using DIC can indicate the existence of kissing bonds with limited load. The results of DIC measurement is encouraging and can be further used for the NDE estimation of mechanical properties of the kissing bond.

Suppression of Vortex Shedding Downstream of a Circular Cylinder Using Permeable Cylinders in Shallow Water

The characteristics of the flow around a 50mm circular cylinder surrounded by a permeable outer cylinder were investigated by Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) and flow visualization techniques in order to control the unsteady flow structure downstream of the cylinder in shallow water. The effect of outer permeable cylinder with a porosity of β = 0.4 on the flow control was studied using five different diameters; D = 60, 70, 80, 90, 100mm. Depth-averaged free stream velocity was kept constant as U = 170mm/s corresponding to a Reynolds number of Re = 8500 and the water height was adjusted to hw = 25mm throughout the study. The results clearly showed that the outer permeable cylinder significantly affects the flow structure of the inner cylinder. It was found that by the existence of outer cylinder, the frequency of unsteady vortex shedding is reduced, vortex formation region is elongated and fluctuations are attenuated which are good indications of effective flow control. Owing to the results, optimum parameters were defined and suggested for the suppression of vortex-induced vibrations on bluff bodies.