This paper is the first part of a two part paper reporting the improvement of efficiency of a one-and-half stage high work axial flow turbine by nonaxisymmetric endwall contouring. In this first paper the design of the endwall contours is described, and the computational fluid dynamics (CFD) flow predictions are compared with five-hole-probe measurements. The endwalls have been designed using automatic numerical optimization by means of a sequential quadratic programming algorithm, the flow being computed with the 3D Reynolds averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) solver TRACE. The aim of the design was to reduce the secondary kinetic energy and secondary losses. The experimental results confirm the improvement of turbine efficiency, showing a stage efficiency benefit of , revealing that the improvement is underestimated by CFD. The secondary flow and loss have been significantly reduced in the vane, but improvement of the midspan flow is also observed. Mainly this loss reduction in the first row and the more homogeneous flow is responsible for the overall improvement. Numerical investigations indicate that the transition modeling on the airfoil strongly influences the secondary loss predictions. The results confirm that nonaxisymmetric endwall profiling is an effective method to improve turbine efficiency but that further modeling work is needed to achieve a good predictability.
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e-mail: thomas.germain@muc.mtu.de
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April 2010
Research Papers
Improving Efficiency of a High Work Turbine Using Nonaxisymmetric Endwalls— Part I: Endwall Design and Performance
T. Germain,
e-mail: thomas.germain@muc.mtu.de
T. Germain
MTU Aero Engines GmbH
, Dachauer Strasse 665, 80995 München, Germany
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M. Nagel,
M. Nagel
MTU Aero Engines GmbH
, Dachauer Strasse 665, 80995 München, Germany
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I. Raab,
I. Raab
MTU Aero Engines GmbH
, Dachauer Strasse 665, 80995 München, Germany
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P. Schüpbach,
P. Schüpbach
Department of Mechanical and Process Engineering, LEC, Laboratory of Energy Conversion,
ETH Zurich
, 8092 Zurich, Switzerland
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R. S. Abhari,
R. S. Abhari
Department of Mechanical and Process Engineering, LEC, Laboratory of Energy Conversion,
ETH Zurich
, 8092 Zurich, Switzerland
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M. Rose
M. Rose
Institute of Aeronautical Propulsion,
University of Stuttgart
, 70569 Stuttgart, Germany
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T. Germain
MTU Aero Engines GmbH
, Dachauer Strasse 665, 80995 München, Germanye-mail: thomas.germain@muc.mtu.de
M. Nagel
MTU Aero Engines GmbH
, Dachauer Strasse 665, 80995 München, Germany
I. Raab
MTU Aero Engines GmbH
, Dachauer Strasse 665, 80995 München, Germany
P. Schüpbach
Department of Mechanical and Process Engineering, LEC, Laboratory of Energy Conversion,
ETH Zurich
, 8092 Zurich, Switzerland
R. S. Abhari
Department of Mechanical and Process Engineering, LEC, Laboratory of Energy Conversion,
ETH Zurich
, 8092 Zurich, Switzerland
M. Rose
Institute of Aeronautical Propulsion,
University of Stuttgart
, 70569 Stuttgart, GermanyJ. Turbomach. Apr 2010, 132(2): 021007 (9 pages)
Published Online: January 12, 2010
Article history
Received:
January 26, 2009
Revised:
February 10, 2009
Online:
January 12, 2010
Published:
January 12, 2010
Connected Content
A companion article has been published:
Improving Efficiency of a High Work Turbine Using Nonaxisymmetric Endwalls—Part II: Time-Resolved Flow Physics
Citation
Germain, T., Nagel, M., Raab, I., Schüpbach, P., Abhari, R. S., and Rose, M. (January 12, 2010). "Improving Efficiency of a High Work Turbine Using Nonaxisymmetric Endwalls— Part I: Endwall Design and Performance." ASME. J. Turbomach. April 2010; 132(2): 021007. https://doi.org/10.1115/1.3106706
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