Abstract
In the cavitation tunnel, the first corner playes role for the flow direction to execute 90-degree turn. So, energy loss is serious, and the cavitation phenomena well occur in the guide vane surface. In this paper, the flow in the first corner was numerically calculated. From the calculation result, cavitation phenomena mainly occurred in the suction side of the last guide vane and vicinity that vane and tunnel wall adjoin each other. And bubbles occurred from all guide vanes if the flow velocity in the test section reaches the any critical value. We could analogize with our experience in the water tunnel that bubbles that occurred in time not vanish, and become miniature in the flow although the pressure recover. So, they circulate with flow in the tunnel, and come into view in the test section. Therefore, first corner must be designed for bubbles not to appear in the test section according to the flow condition like velocity and pressure demanded by the experiment. We analyzed flow in case that the first elbow configuration was redesigned and some of the existing guides vanes were eliminated. And we presented that first elbow can be easely designed for the improvement of tunnel performance through the computational analysis.