Numerical Simulation and Experimental Study of the Rotor–Stator Interaction of a Turbine Under Variable Flow Coefficients

Abstract

Clarifying the gas ingestion mechanism in the turbine disc cavity of marine gas turbines is crucial for ensuring the normal operation of turbines. However, the ingestion is influenced by factors such as the rotational pumping effect, mainstream pressure asymmetry, rotor–stator interaction, and unsteady flow structures, complicating the flow. To investigate the impact of rotor–stator interaction on ingestion, this paper decouples the model to include only the mainstream. This research employs experiments and numerical simulations to examine the effects of varying the flow coefficient through changes in rotational speed and mainstream flow rate. The main objective is to understand the influence of different rotor–stator interactions on the mainstream pressure field, accompanied by mechanistic explanations. The findings reveal inconsistent effects of the two methods for changing the flow coefficient on the mainstream pressure field. Particularly, the pressure distribution on the vane side primarily depends on the mainstream flow rate, while the pressure on the blade side is influenced by the mainstream flow rate and the attack angle represented by the flow coefficient. A larger angle of attack angle can increase pressure on the blade side, even surpassing the pressure on the vane side. Assessing the degree of mainstream pressure unevenness solely based on the pressure difference on the vane side is insufficient. This research provides a basis for subsequent studies on the influence of coupled real turbine rotor–stator interaction on gas ingestion.

Keywords

Rotor–stator interaction / Pressure field / Flow coefficients / Unsteady Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes modeling (URANS) / Attack angle

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Harbin Engineering University and Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature