Ex perime ntal

Inve st igation of
Im pelle r-Dif fuse r
Interactio n
Rita Patel, Eric Savory and Robert Martinuzzi
 Outlin e
• Background
• Motivation
• Current Work
– Design of experimental rig
– CFD analysis
• Results and discussion
• Conclusions
• Future Work
Te rminolo gy

Cumpsty (1978)
 Typ es o f Impell ers
and Dif fu sers
Impellers
• Radially ending Diffusers
• Backswept • Vaneless
• Pre-swirl
• Vaned
• Above w/splitter – Radial
blades
– Wedge
• Discrete-passage

Pictures courtesy of Compressor Branch NASA Glenn Research Center

 Radia l I mpelle r
Disc harg e
• Increasing BL on
Jet
shroud-suction side
due to curvature
Wake
– Separation
PS
– Wake on shroud-
SS suction side
– Jet displaced to hub-
pressure side

Dean and Senoo (1960), Eckardt (1976)

& Krain (1981)
 Di ffuse r I nle t
• Large inlet distortions due to impeller
wake
– Angle and velocity fluctuations
• Distortions have least effect in passage
diffusers than vaned, and most in
vaneless
• Mixing-out of jet-wake stimulated by
presence of vanes
 Im pelle r-Dif fuse r
Interactio n
• Vanes
– Stationary vanes produce unsteady pressure
disturbances to rotating impeller, Gallus et al.
(2003)
– Velocity fluctuations of 17-20% in vaneless space,
Krain (1981)
– Cause of backflow to impeller, Cui (2003)
– Decrease traveled distance of impeller discharge
distortion, Ghiglione et al. (1998)
 Im pelle r-Dif fuse r
Interactio n (c ont’d )
• Radial Gap
– Too small = increase backflow, Cumpsty
and Inoue (1984)
– Too large = less mixing-out of jet-wake
Gallus et al. (2003)
 Motiva tio n
Why study impeller-diffuser interaction
when numerous studies have been done?
• All configurations are different
– This project will lead into the
study of a tandem-bladed
impeller coupled with a fishtail
diffuser
– Study the magnitude and effect
of pressure disturbances in
vaneless space
– Validate previously obtained
CFD results
Picture courtesy of Douglas Roberts (P&WC)
 Curr ent Work
• Design a test facility (SCR*) that
simulates a typical radial impeller exit
flow field in steady state through a non-
rotating cascade configuration
– 5 stationary radial impeller blades
– Diffuser with 5 flat plate splitters
– Pipe to provide required inlet flow
• Obtain LDV data of flow field

*Stationary Cascade Rig

 Purpose o f SCR
• CFD
– Experimental validation of results obtained on SCR
• Seeding flow distribution, flow patterns, etc…

• Better understanding of
how to apply LDV
technique to a full-scale rig
– Test use of very small
optical access ports
– Type of seeding for this
specific flow

Picture courtesy of Douglas Roberts (P&WC)

SC R
 Impeller + Diffuser

Close-up of impeller
 Op tic al Access
10mm diameter

15mm diameter

Upstream Impeller Blades Blade passages ‘hub side’

Se eding Ports

Six Ports
 SCR Sp ecific ations

Inlet Outlet
Ttip 2.51 1.04 [mm]
Thub 2.62 4.27 [mm] • Outlet Ma: 0.85
hblade 23.37 15.75 [mm]
Ablade 59.95 41.80 [mm 2] • Total length: 2.0 [m]
[mm 2]
A5 blades
Ageometrical
299.75
2849.67
209.00
2998.19 [mm 2]
• Total height: 1.4 [m]
A5 passages
m
2549.92
0.288
2789.19
0.288
[mm 2]
[kg/s]
• Similar physical
alpha 0.00 72.00 deg dimensions of full-
c2
cr2
n/a
n/a
291.69
90.14
[m/s]
[m/s]
scale rig
cx1 94.84 n/a [m/s]
 CF D An aly sis
• ICEM CFD 10.0 with CFX 10.0
Mesh:
1.1 million tetrahedral
+ 0.2 million prism
element mesh

• SST k-ω model

Boundary Conditions:
Inlet: Ptotal = 172.4 [kPa] mexpected= 0.245 kg/s
Ttotal = 288.15 [K]
Outlet: Pstatic = 101.3 [kPa] mCFX= 0.242 kg/s
Mach Nu mb er Co ntour Plo t
- Impeller-diffuser
only

- Region of high
velocity in left
most passage

- Obtaining close
to desired Ma of
0.85 at impeller
exit

50% blade height

Flo w Be havio ur

• Shock wave at trailing

edge of each blade

• Passage width
increasing, while height
decreasing

• Greater shock wave in

left passage as result of
diffuser sidewall
Flo w Be havio ur
 Bla de
Passa ges

Migration of high velocity

Flow behaviour similar region to shroud suction-
in passages up to outlet side and vice versa
Pr essure Co ntour Plot
-impeller-
diffuser only

Suction side - Typical blade

suction/pressure
behaviour
Pressure side
- Corresponding
region of low
pressure in left
most passage
 Conclu si ons
• From CFX results
– Presence of separation in diffuser
– No separation in impeller
– Good flow pattern agreement between blade passages
• Close agreement between theoretically
calculated and CFX values at boundaries
• SCR will provide a good understanding of how
to apply LDV technique in a high-speed, highly-
confined, compressible flow
 Future Wo rk
• Experimental
– Measurements in SCRF
– Compare with current CFD results

• Computational
– Track seeding particles

• Apply LDV technique and CFD model on full-

scale rig at P&WC
 Acknowledgements
• Advanced Fluid Mechanics Research Group
– http://www.eng.uwo.ca/research/afm/default.htm

• Kevin Barker and Doug Phillips

– University Machine Shop

• Rofiqul Islam
– University of Calgary

• Suresh Kacker, Douglas Roberts, Feng Shi and Peter

Townsend
– Pratt and Whitney Canada
Thank You

Questions?