Flutter Analysis of Multiple Blade Rows Vibrating Under Aerodynamic Coupling

This paper deals with the aeroelastic instability of vibrating multiple blade rows under aerodynamic coupling with each other. A model composed of three blade rows, e.g., rotor-stator-rotor, where blades of the two rotor cascades are simultaneously vibrating, is considered. The displacement of a blade vibrating under aerodynamic force is expanded in a modal series with the natural mode shape functions, and the modal amplitudes are treated as the generalized coordinates. The generalized mass matrix and the generalized stiffness matrix are formulated on the basis of the finite element concept. The generalized aerodynamic force on a vibrating blade consists of the component induced by the motion of the blade itself and those induced not only by vibrations of other blades of the same cascade but also vibrations of blades in another cascade. To evaluate the aerodynamic forces, the unsteady lifting surface theory for the model of three blade rows is applied. The so-called k method is applied to determine the critical flutter conditions. A numerical study has been conducted. The flutter boundaries are compared with those for a single blade row. It is shown that the effect of the aerodynamic blade row coupling substantially modifies the critical flutter conditions.