Unsteady Responses of the Impeller of a Centrifugal Compressor Exposed to Pulsating Backpressure

Author(s):  
Mengying Shu ◽  
Mingyang Yang ◽  
Ricardo F. Martinez-Botas ◽  
Kangyao Deng ◽  
Lei Shi

The flow in intake manifold of a heavily downsized internal combustion engine has increased levels of unsteadiness due to the reduction of cylinder number and manifold arrangement. The turbocharger compressor is thus exposed to significant pulsating backpressure. This paper studies the response of a centrifugal compressor to this unsteadiness using an experimentally validated numerical method. A computational fluid dynamic (CFD) model with the volute and impeller is established and validated by experimental measurements. Following this, an unsteady three-dimensional (3D) simulation is conducted on a single passage imposed by the pulsating backpressure conditions, which are obtained by one-dimensional (1D) unsteady simulation. The performance of the rotor passage deviates from the steady performance and a hysteresis loop, which encapsulates the steady condition, is formed. Moreover, the unsteadiness of the impeller performance is enhanced as the mass flow rate reduces. The pulsating performance and flow structures near stall are more favorable than those seen at constant backpressure. The flow behavior at points with the same instantaneous mass flow rate is substantially different at different time locations on the pulse. The flow in the impeller is determined by not only the instantaneous boundary condition but also by the evolution history of flow field. This study provides insights in the influence of pulsating backpressure on compressor performance in actual engine situations, from which better turbo-engine matching might be benefited.

Author(s):  
Mengying Shu ◽  
Mingyang Yang ◽  
Ricardo F. Martinez-Botas ◽  
Kangyao Deng ◽  
Lei Shi

The flow in intake manifolds of internal combustion engine becomes more unsteady because of engine downsizing which is achieved by reducing cylinder number and increasing the boosting. Turbocharger compressor is thus exposed to the enhanced pulsating backpressure. This paper studies responses of a centrifugal compressor to the pulsating backpressure via experimentally validated numerical method. Firstly, CFD model with the volute and all impeller passages is established and validated by experimental measurements. Then the unsteady three-dimensional simulation is conducted on a single passage imposed by the pulsating backpressure conditions which are obtained by 1-D unsteady simulation. Results show that the performance of the passage evidently deviates from steady performance. Hysteresis loops of the performance appear at pulsating backpressure conditions, which encapsulate the performance at steady conditions. Moreover, the unsteadiness of the impeller performance is enhanced as the mass flow rate reduces. The performance and flow structures of the impeller near stall for the pulsating case are more favorable than that at corresponding constant backpressure. Furthermore, flow structures at points with the same instant mass flow rate are also notably different when they are located at different strokes of the pulse. The flow in the impeller is determined by not only the instant boundary condition but also the evolution history of flow field. The dynamic stall which is analogue to the phenomenon on pitching airfoil happens in the compressor and delays the instability of the device when it is exposed to pulsating backpressure. This study provides useful insights in the influence of pulsating backpressure on compressor performance in actual engine situations, from which better turbo-engine matching might be benefited.


Author(s):  
Mengying Shu ◽  
Mingyang Yang ◽  
Kaiyue Zhang ◽  
Ricardo F. Martinez-Botas ◽  
Kangyao Deng

Abstract The flow in the intake manifold of a downsized internal combustion engine has become more unsteady due to the reduction of cylinder number and increasing boosting level. The turbocharger compressor is thus imposed by an unsteady backpressure when matched with an engine. It has been experimentally confirmed that the compressor performance is affected when exposed to pulsating backpressure. In order to enhance compressor stability and achieve better turbo-engine matching, it is necessary to understand behaviors of compressor at pulsating backpressure conditions. In this study, the performance of compressor exposed to pulsating backpressure is experimentally studied on the compressor test rig located in Shanghai Jiao Tong University. The results show that compressor performance with pulsating backpressure is notably different from the one with constant backpressure. Hysteresis loops which encapsulate the steady performance are generated at pulsating backpressure conditions due to filling-emptying effect. The mass flow rate, pulse frequency and compressor rotational speed all have evident influence on dynamic behaviors of the compressor. As the mass flow rate and rotational speed increase, hysteresis loops are enlarged and the unsteady behaviors are enhanced. The influence of pulsating backpressure on the compressor surge margin is analyzed in detail. Results demonstrate that the stable operation range is evidently influenced by the pulsating backpressure. Particularly, the mass flow rate of surge is postponed by 15.1% compared with the corresponding constant backpressure condition. Fast Fourier Transform method (FFT) is applied to identify the initiation of surge. The frequency domain analysis proves that the pulsating backpressure has little influence on the frequency of surge, but the strength of surge is alleviated indicated by the magnitude of fluctuations. The study provides an insight on the influence of pulsating backpressure on the centrifugal compressor, which can benefit the design methodology of compressor as well as turbo-engine matching.


Materials ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (8) ◽  
pp. 2033
Author(s):  
Amjid Khan ◽  
Muhammad Irfan ◽  
Usama Muhammad Niazi ◽  
Imran Shah ◽  
Stanislaw Legutko ◽  
...  

Downsizing in engine size is pushing the automotive industry to operate compressors at low mass flow rate. However, the operation of turbocharger centrifugal compressor at low mass flow rate leads to fluid flow instabilities such as stall. To reduce flow instability, surface roughness is employed as a passive flow control method. This paper evaluates the effect of surface roughness on a turbocharger centrifugal compressor performance. A realistic validation of SRV2-O compressor stage designed and developed by German Aerospace Center (DLR) is achieved from comparison with the experimental data. In the first part, numerical simulations have been performed from stall to choke to study the overall performance variation at design conditions: 2.55 kg/s mass flow rate and rotational speed of 50,000 rpm. In second part, surface roughness of magnitude range 0–200 μm has been applied on the diffuser shroud to control flow instability. It was found that completely rough regime showed effective quantitative results in controlling stall phenomena, which results in increases of operating range from 16% to 18% and stall margin from 5.62% to 7.98%. Surface roughness as a passive flow control method to reduce flow instability in the diffuser section is the novelty of this research. Keeping in view the effects of surface roughness, it will help the turbocharger manufacturers to reduce the flow instabilities in the compressor with ease and improve the overall performance.


2010 ◽  
Vol 132 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yoon Jo Kim ◽  
Yogendra K. Joshi ◽  
Andrei G. Fedorov ◽  
Young-Joon Lee ◽  
Sung-Kyu Lim

It is now widely recognized that the three-dimensional (3D) system integration is a key enabling technology to achieve the performance needs of future microprocessor integrated circuits (ICs). To provide modular thermal management in 3D-stacked ICs, the interlayer microfluidic cooling scheme is adopted and analyzed in this study focusing on a single cooling layer performance. The effects of cooling mode (single-phase versus phase-change) and stack/layer geometry on thermal management performance are quantitatively analyzed, and implications on the through-silicon-via scaling and electrical interconnect congestion are discussed. Also, the thermal and hydraulic performance of several two-phase refrigerants is discussed in comparison with single-phase cooling. The results show that the large internal pressure and the pumping pressure drop are significant limiting factors, along with significant mass flow rate maldistribution due to the presence of hot-spots. Nevertheless, two-phase cooling using R123 and R245ca refrigerants yields superior performance to single-phase cooling for the hot-spot fluxes approaching ∼300 W/cm2. In general, a hybrid cooling scheme with a dedicated approach to the hot-spot thermal management should greatly improve the two-phase cooling system performance and reliability by enabling a cooling-load-matched thermal design and by suppressing the mass flow rate maldistribution within the cooling layer.


Author(s):  
Yang Chen ◽  
Jun Li ◽  
Chaoyang Tian ◽  
Gangyun Zhong ◽  
Xiaoping Fan ◽  
...  

The aerodynamic performance of three-stage turbine with different types of leakage flows was experimentally and numerically studied in this paper. The leakage flows of three-stage turbine included the shroud seal leakage flow between the rotor blade tip and case, the diaphragm seal leakage flow between the stator blade diaphragm and shaft, as well as the shaft packing leakage flow and the gap leakage flow between the rotor blade curved fir-tree root and wheel disk. The total aerodynamic performance of three-stage turbine including leakage flows was firstly experimentally measured. The detailed flow field and aerodynamic performance were also numerically investigated using three-dimensional Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) and S-A turbulence model. The numerical mass flow rate and efficiency showed well agreement with experimental data. The effects of leakage flows between the fir-tree root and the wheel disk were studied. All leakage mass flow fractions, including the mass flow rate in each hole for all sets of root gaps were given for comparison. The effect of leakage flow on the aerodynamic performance of three-stage was illustrated and discussed.


2018 ◽  
Vol 20 (6) ◽  
pp. 624-639 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kang Song ◽  
Ben Zhao ◽  
Harold Sun ◽  
Weilin Yi

Turbocharger compressor, when fitted to a vehicle, usually operates with a curved inlet pipe which leads to distorted inlet flow field, hence deteriorating compressor flow capability. During the measurement of compressor performance, turbocharger-engine matching and controller design, the inlet flow field is, however, assumed to be uniform, which deviates from the real-world conditions. Consequently, the overall system performance could be compromised if the inlet distortion effect is ignored. To address this issue, in this article, a turbomachinery physics-based zero-dimensional model was proposed for the mass flow rate of a compressor with distorted inlet flow field due to 90° and 180° bent inlet pipe. The non-uniform flow is approximated as two-zone flow field, similar to parallel compressors, with the total pressure deviation between two zones modeled as a function of the flow velocity and pipe geometry. For each flow zone, the corresponding mass flow rate is estimated by approximating each sub-compressor as an adiabatic nozzle, where the fluid is driven by external work delivered by a compressor wheel governed by Euler’s turbomachinery equation. By including turbomachinery physics and compressor geometry information into the modeling, the model achieves high fidelity in compressor map interpretation and extrapolation, which is validated in experiments and the three-dimensional computational fluid dynamic simulation.


Author(s):  
Hemant Kumar ◽  
Chetan S. Mistry

Abstract The Supercritical carbon-dioxide Brayton cycle main attraction is due to the Supercritical characteristic of the working fluid, carbon-dioxide (SCO2). Some of the advantages of using SCO2 are relatively low turbine inlet temperature, the compression work will be low, and the system will be compact due to the variation of thermodynamic properties (like density, and specific heat ratio) of SCO2 near the critical point. SCO2 behave more like liquid when its state is near the critical point (Total Pressure = 7.39 MPa, Total Temperature = 305 K), operating compressor inlet near critical point can minimize compression work. For present study the centrifugal compressor was designed to operate at 75,000 rpm with pressure ratio (P.R) = 1.8 and mass flow rate = 3.53 kg/s as available from Sandai report. Meanline design for centrifugal compressor with SCO2 properties was done. The blade geometry was developed using commercial CAD Ansys Bladegen. The flow domain was meshed using Ansys TurboGrid. ANSYS CFX was used as a solver for present numerical study. The thermodynamic properties of SCO2 were imported from the ANSYS flow material library using SCO2.RPG [NIST thermal physics properties of fluid system]. In order to ensure the change in flow physics the mesh independence study was also conducted. The present paper discuss about the performance and flow field study targeting different mass flow rates as exit boundary condition. The comparison of overall performance (Pressure Ratio, the Blade loading, Stage efficiency and Density variation) was done with three different mass flow rates. The designed and simulated centrifugal compressor meets the designed pressure rise requirement. The variation of mass flow rate on performance of centrifugal compressor was tend to be similar to conventional centrifugal compressor. The paper discusses about the effect of variation in density, specific heat ratio and pressure of SCO2 with different mass flow outlet condition. The performance map of numerical study were validated with experiment results and found in good agreement with experimental results. The change in flow properties within the rotor flow passage are found to be interesting and very informative for future such centrifugal compressor design for special application of SCO2 Brayton cycle. 80% mass flow rate has given better results in terms of aerodynamic performance. Abrupt change in thermodynamic properties was observed near impeller inlet region. Strong density variations are observed at compressor inlet.


Author(s):  
Rayapati Subbarao ◽  
M. Govardhan

Abstract In a Counter Rotating Turbine (CRT), the stationary nozzle is trailed by two rotors that rotate in the opposite direction to each other. Flow in a CRT stage is multifaceted and more three dimensional, especially, in the gap between nozzle and rotor 1 as well as rotor 1 and rotor 2. By varying this gap between the blade rows, the flow and wake pattern can be changed favorably and may lead to improved performance. Present work analyzes the aspect of change in flow field through the interface, especially the wake pattern and deviation in flow with change in spacing. The components of turbine stage are modeled for different gaps between the components using ANSYS® ICEM CFD 14.0. Normalized flow rates ranging from 0.091 to 0.137 are used. The 15, 30, 50 and 70% of the average axial chords are taken as axial gaps in the present analysis. CFX 14.0 is used for simulation. At nozzle inlet, stagnation pressure boundary condition is used. At the turbine stage or rotor 2 outlet, mass flow rate is specified. Pressure distribution contours at the outlets of the blade rows describe the flow pattern clearly in the interface region. Wake strength at nozzle outlet is more for the lowest gap. At rotor 1 outlet, it is less for x/a = 0.3 and increases with gap. Incidence angles at the inlets of rotors are less for the smaller gaps. Deviation angle at the outlet of rotor 1 is also considered, as rotor 1-rotor 2 interaction is more significant in CRT. Deviation angle at rotor 1 outlet is minimum for this gap. Also, for the intermediate mass flow rate of 0.108, x/a = 0.3 is giving more stage performance. This suggests that at certain axial gap, there is better wake convection and flow outline, when compared to other gap cases. Further, it is identified that for the axial gap of x/a = 0.3 and the mean mass flow rate of 0.108, the performance of CRT is maximum. It is clear that the flow pattern at the interface is changing the incidence and deviation with change in axial gap and flow rate. This study is useful for the gas turbine community to identify the flow rates and gaps at which any CRT stage would perform better.


Author(s):  
Mirko Baratta ◽  
Andrea E. Catania ◽  
Nicola Rapetto ◽  
Alois Fuerhapter ◽  
Matthias Gerlich ◽  
...  

In the last few years, a significant research effort has been made for developing and enhancing Direct Injection (DI) for compressed natural gas (CNG) engines. Several research projects have been promoted by the European Community (EC) in this field with the objective of finding new solutions for the automotive market and also of encouraging a fruitful knowledge exchange among car manufacturers, suppliers and technical universities. This paper concerns part of the research activity that has been carried out by the Politecnico di Torino, AVL List GmbH and Siemens AG within the EC VII Framework Program (FP) InGAS Collaborative Project (CP), aimed at optimizing the control phase of a new injector for CNG direct injection, paying specific attention to its behavior at small injected-fuel amounts, i.e., small energizing times. The CNG injector which was developed within the research project proved to be suitable to be used in a DI SI engine, featuring a pent-roof combustion chamber head and a bowl in piston, with reference to both homogeneous and stratified charge formation. Fuel flow measurements made by AVL on the four-cylinder engine revealed a good linearity between injection duration and fuel mass-flow rate for injection durations above a reference value. In order to improve the injector characterization at short injection durations, an experimental and numerical activity was designed. More specifically, a multidimensional CFD model of the actual injector geometry was built by Politecnico di Torino, and purposely-designed simulation cases were carried out, in which the needle-lift time-history was defined on the basis of experimental measurements made by Siemens. The numerical model was validated on the basis of experimental data concerning the total injected-fuel amount under different conditions. Then, the model was applied in order to evaluate the dynamic flow characteristic by taking also the inner geometry of the injector valve group into account, so as to establish a correlation to the needle lift measurements done by Siemens for injector characterization. In the paper this dynamic behavior of the injector is analyzed, under actual operating conditions, and its impact on the nozzle injection capability is discussed. The simulation results did not show significant oscillations of the stagnation pressure upstream of the nozzle throat section, and thus the resultant mass-flow rate profile is almost proportional to the needle-lift one. As a consequence, in order to characterize the injector flow behavior in the nonlinear region (short injection duration), the measurement of needle lift is sufficient.


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