Effects of the Low Reynolds Number on the Loss Characteristics in a Transonic Axial Compressor

A three-dimensional computation was conducted to understand effects of the low Reynolds number on the loss characteristics in a transonic axial compressor, Rotor67. As a gas turbine becomes smaller in size and it is operated at high altitude, the operating condition frequently lies at low Reynolds number. It is generally known that wall boundary layers are thickened and a large separation occurs on the blade surface in axial turbomachinery as the Reynolds number decreases. In this study, it was found that the large viscosity did not affect on the bow shock at the leading edge but significantly did on the location and the intensity of the passage shock. The passage shock moved upstream towards leading edge and its intensity decreased at the low Reynolds number. This change had large effects on the performance as well as the internal flows such as the pressure distribution on the blade surface, tip leakage flow and separation. The total pressure rise and the adiabatic efficiency decreased about 3% individually at the same normalized mass flow rate at the low Reynolds number. In order to analyze this performance drop caused by the low Reynolds number, the total pressure loss was scrutinized through major loss categories such as profile loss, tip leakage loss, endwall loss and shock loss.