Radial Decomposition of Blade Vibration to Identify a Stall Flutter Source in a Transonic Fan

2019 ◽  
Vol 141 (10) ◽  
Author(s):  
Q. Rendu ◽  
M. Vahdati ◽  
L. Salles

Abstract This paper investigates the three dimensionality of the unsteady flow responsible for stall flutter instability. Nonlinear unsteady Reynolds-averaged Navier–Stokes (RANS) computations are used to predict the aeroelastic behavior of a fan blade at part speed. Flutter is experienced by the blades at low mass flow for the first flap mode at nodal diameter 2. The maximal energy exchange is located near the tip of the blade, at 90% span. The modeshape is radially decomposed to investigate the main source of instability. This decomposition method is validated for the first time in 3D using a time-marching nonlinear solver. The source of stall flutter is finally found at 65% span where the local vibration induces an unstable oscillation of the shock-wave of large amplitude. This demonstrates that the radial migration of the pressure fluctuations must be taken into account to predict stall flutter.

Author(s):  
William S. Clark ◽  
Kenneth C. Hall

In this paper, we present a computational fluid dynamic model of the unsteady flow associated with the onset of stall flutter in turbomachinery cascades. The unsteady flow is modeled using the laminar Navier-Stokes equations. We assume that the unsteadiness in the flow is a small harmonic disturbance about the mean or steady flow. Therefore, the unsteady flow is governed by a small-disturbance form of the Navier-Stokes equations. These linear variable coefficient equations are discretized on a deforming computational grid and solved efficiently using a multiple-grid Lax-Wendroff scheme. A number of numerical examples are presented which demonstrate the destabilizing influence of viscosity on the aeroelastic stability of airfoils in cascade, especially for torsional modes of blade vibration.


Author(s):  
Mehdi Vahdati ◽  
Nick Cumpsty

This paper describes stall flutter, which can occur at part speed operating conditions near the stall boundary. Although it is called stall flutter, this phenomenon does not require the stalling of the fan blade in the sense that it can occur when the slope of the pressure rise characteristic is still negative. This type of flutter occurs with low nodal diameter forward traveling waves and it occurs for the first flap (1F) mode of blade vibration. For this paper, a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) code has been applied to a real fan of contemporary design; the code has been found to be reliable in predicting mean flow and aeroelastic behavior. When the mass flow is reduced, the flow becomes unstable, resulting in flutter or in stall (the stall perhaps leading to surge). When the relative tip speed into the fan rotor is close to sonic, it is found (by measurement and by computation) that the instability for the fan blade considered in this work results in flutter. The CFD has been used like an experimental technique, varying parameters to understand what controls the instability behavior. It is found that the flutter for this fan requires a separated region on the suction surface. It is also found that the acoustic pressure field associated with the blade vibration must be cut-on upstream of the rotor and cut-off downstream of the rotor if flutter instability is to occur. The difference in cut off conditions upstream and downstream is largely produced by the mean swirl velocity introduced by the fan rotor in imparting work and pressure rise to the air. The conditions for instability therefore require a three-dimensional geometric description and blades with finite mean loading. The third parameter that governs the flutter stability of the blade is the ratio of the twisting motion to the plunging motion of the 1F mode shape, which determines the ratio of leading edge (LE) displacement to the trailing edge (TE) displacement. It will be shown that as this ratio increases the onset of flutter moves to a lower mass flow.


Author(s):  
Mizuho Aotsuka ◽  
Takeshi Murooka

This paper describes numerical investigation of fan transonic stall flutter, especially focused on flutter bite. A transonic stall flutter occurs in high loaded condition at part rotating speed. A region of the transonic stall flutter occasionally protrudes to an operating line at narrow rotational speed range. This protrusion of flutter boundary is called flutter bite. In that case, it is necessary to re-design the blade for securing sufficient operating range. The re-design process might require some compromise on performance and/or weight, and takes long time. So it is important to understand the mechanism of the flutter bite. Two types of fan blade, one has a flutter bite and another dose not, are numerically studied with a 3D Navier Stokes CFD code. Numerical results show agreement with rig test results for the fans in qualitative sense. Detailed flow fields reveal that a detached shock wave and separation due to the shock boundary layer interaction play significant role for the flutter stability.


2002 ◽  
Vol 124 (2) ◽  
pp. 285-292 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. D. Li ◽  
L. He

Computations of unsteady flows due to inlet distortion driven blade vibrations, characterized by long circumferential wavelengths, typically need to be carried out in multi-passage/whole-annulus domains. In the present work, a single-passage three-dimensional unsteady Navier-Stokes approach has been developed and applied to unsteady flows around vibrating blades of a transonic fan rotor (NASA Rotor-67) with inlet distortions. The phase-shifted periodic condition is applied using a Fourier series based method, “shape-correction,” which enables a single-passage solution to unsteady flows under influences of multiple disturbances with arbitrary interblade phase angles. The computational study of the transonic fan illustrates that unsteady flow response to an inlet distortion varies greatly depending on its circumferential wavelength. The response to a long wavelength (whole-annulus) distortion is strongly nonlinear with a significant departure of its time-averaged flow from the steady state, while that at a short wavelength (two passages) behaves largely in a linear manner. Nevertheless, unsteady pressures due to blade vibration, though noticeably different under different inlet distortions, show a linear behavior. Thus, the nonlinearity of the flow response to inlet distortion appears to influence the aerodynamic damping predominantly by means of changing the time-averaged flow. Good agreements between single-passage solutions and multi-passage solutions are obtained for all the conditions considered, which clearly demonstrates the validity of the phase-shifted periodicity at a transonic nonlinear distorted flow condition. For the present cases, typical CPU time saving by a factor of 5–10 is achieved by the single-passage solutions.


Author(s):  
Abdulnaser I. Sayma ◽  
Mehdi Vahdti ◽  
Mehmet Imregun ◽  
John Marshal

This paper describes a numerical modelling methodology for fan blade forced response calculations by considering the low-pressure compression system (LPCS) as a whole in order to include flow distortions caused by the asymmetric flight intake upstream, and the pylon downstream. Emphasis also is placed on blade mistuning or mis-placement which may be due to inherent manufacturing and assembly tolerances, or to small inservice displacements. Several levels of geometric complexity were used in the analysis, ranging from an isolated fan bladerow to a complete LPCS of a large-diameter aero-engine, consisting of the intake duct, the fan assembly, the outflow guide vanes, the pylon and a downstream nozzle. The aerodynamic model was coupled to a finite element model of the fan assembly for computing the blade vibration levels. The study revealed two major findings. The first is the unsteady forcing under one engine-order (1EO) excitation is found to be linked to the mean shock position on the fan blade, the highest forcing occurring when the shock is just swallowed since this position is particularly sensitive to pressure fluctuations. The second finding is that the 1EO fan assembly forcing resulting from an asymmetric intake and the pylon are of comparable magnitude but their relative phasing is the key parameter in determining the overall fan forced response levels.


Processes ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (7) ◽  
pp. 1182
Author(s):  
Seung-Jun Kim ◽  
Yong Cho ◽  
Jin-Hyuk Kim

Under low flow-rate conditions, a Francis turbine exhibits precession of a vortex rope with pressure fluctuations in the draft tube. These undesirable flow phenomena can lead to deterioration of the turbine performance as manifested by torque and power output fluctuations. In order to suppress the rope with precession and a swirl component in the tube, the use of anti-swirl fins was investigated in a previous study. However, vortex rope generation still occurred near the cone of the tube. In this study, unsteady-state Reynolds-averaged Navier–Stokes analyses were conducted with a scale-adaptive simulation shear stress transport turbulence model. This model was used to observe the effects of the injection in the draft tube on the unsteady internal flow and pressure phenomena considering both active and passive suppression methods. The air injection affected the generation and suppression of the vortex rope and swirl component depending on the flow rate of the air. In addition, an injection level of 0.5%Q led to a reduction in the maximum unsteady pressure characteristics.


2007 ◽  
Vol 2007 ◽  
pp. 1-10 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shijie Guo

This paper demonstrates the investigations on the blade vibration of a radial inflow micro gas turbine wheel. Firstly, the dependence of Young's modulus on temperature was measured since it is a major concern in structure analysis. It is demonstrated that Young's modulus depends on temperature greatly and the dependence should be considered in vibration analysis, but the temperature gradient from the leading edge to the trailing edge of a blade can be ignored by applying the mean temperature. Secondly, turbine blades suffer many excitations during operation, such as pressure fluctuations (unsteady aerodynamic forces), torque fluctuations, and so forth. Meanwhile, they have many kinds of vibration modes, typical ones being blade-hub (disk) coupled modes and blade-shaft (torsional, longitudinal) coupled modes. Model experiments and FEM analysis were conducted to study the coupled vibrations and to identify the modes which are more likely to be excited. The results show that torque fluctuations and uniform pressure fluctuations are more likely to excite resonance of blade-shaft (torsional, longitudinal) coupled modes. Impact excitations and propagating pressure fluctuations are more likely to excite blade-hub (disk) coupled modes.


2006 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peng Sun ◽  
Guotal Feng

A time-accurate three-dimensional Navier-Stokes solver of the unsteady flow field in a transonic fan was carried out using "Fluent-parallel" in a parallel supercomputer. The numerical simulation focused on a transonic fan with inlet square wave total pressure distortion and the analysis of result consisted of three aspects. The first was about inlet parameters redistribution and outlet total temperature distortion induced by inlet total pressure distortion. The pattern and causation of flow loss caused by pressure distortion in rotor were analyzed secondly. It was found that the influence of distortion was different at different radial positions. In hub area, transportation-loss and mixing-loss were the main loss patterns. Distortion not only complicated them but enhanced them. Especially in stator, inlet total pressure distortion induced large-scale vortex, which produced backflow and increased the loss. While in casing area, distortion changed the format of shock wave and increased the shock loss. Finally, the format of shock wave and the hysteresis of rotor to distortion were analyzed in detail.


Author(s):  
Hongsik Im ◽  
Xiangying Chen ◽  
Gecheng Zha

Detached eddy simulation of an aeroelastic self-excited instability, flutter in NASA Rotor 67 is conducted using a fully coupled fluid/structre interaction. Time accurate compressible 3D Navier-Stokes equations are solved with a system of 5 decoupled modal equations in a fully coupled manner. The 5th order WENO scheme for the inviscid flux and the 4th order central differencing for the viscous flux are used to accurately capture interactions between the flow and vibrating blades with the DES (detached eddy simulation) of turbulence. A moving mesh concept that can improve mesh quality over the rotor tip clearance was implemented. Flutter simulations were first conducted from choke to stall using 4 blade passages. Stall flutter initiated at rotating stall onset, grows dramatically with resonance. The frequency analysis shows that resonance occurs at the first mode of the rotor blade. Before stall, the predicted responses of rotor blades decayed with time, resulting in no flutter. Full annulus simulation at peak point verifies that one can use the multi-passage approach with periodic boundary for the flutter prediction.


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