• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
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• 1995.11a
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• pp.169-171
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• 1995

Automatic control equipment in hydro power plant, such as turbine governor or automatic voltage regulator have to act promptly against for variation of power system, so it is necessary to check and test continuously. During last five years, the performance test of automatic control equipment was performed about 20 units of hydro turbine generator. In this process, because it has complex connection and before calibration, signal conditioner was developed as an auxiliary equipment for performance test. It includes function of signal amplifier, transducer, and meters. As a result of use this equipment for electric governor test at soyang-gang hydro power plant, it was possible to find output data equal to old one.

• The KSFM Journal of Fluid Machinery
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.5-10
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• 2016

As a key component of a Francis turbine facility, the runner performance plays a vital role in the performance of the turbine. It is effective and successful to design a Francis turbine runner blade with good performance by one dimensional hydraulic design method. On the basis of one dimensional hydraulic analysis, there are a lot of parameters of the internal flow passage shapes determined by experience. Among those parameters, the effect of port area of blade on the performance of a Francis turbine is investigated in this study. A given Francis turbine model was selected for investigating the port area of blade on the performance. The result shows that the effect of port area of runner blade on the outflow angle from runner passage on the performance is quite significant. A correct exit flow angle reduces the energy loss at draft tube, which has the best efficiency of the turbine model.

• International Journal of Fluid Machinery and Systems
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• v.3 no.4
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• pp.352-359
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• 2010

In recent years, the market has shown increasing interest in pump-turbines. The prompt availability of pumped storage plants and the benefits to the power system achieved by peak lopping, providing reserve capacity, and rapid response in frequency control are providing a growing advantage. In this context, there is a need to develop pumpturbines that can reliably withstand dynamic operation modes, fast changes of discharge rate by adjusting the variable diffuser vanes, as well as fast changes from pumping to turbine operation. In the first part of the present study, various flow patterns linked to operation of a pump-turbine system are discussed. In this context, pump and turbine modes are presented separately and different load cases are shown in each operating mode. In order to create modern, competitive pump-turbine designs, this study further explains what design challenges should be considered in defining the geometry of a pump-turbine impeller. The second part of the paper describes an innovative, staggered approach to impeller development, applied to a low head pump-turbine project. The first level of the process consists of optimization strategies based on evolutionary algorithms together with 3D in-viscid flow analysis. In the next stage, the hydraulic behavior of both pump mode and turbine mode is evaluated by solving the full 3D Navier-Stokes equations in combination with a robust turbulence model. Finally, the progress in hydraulic design is demonstrated by model test results that show a significant improvement in hydraulic performance compared to an existing reference design.

• International Journal of Fluid Machinery and Systems
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• v.8 no.4
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• pp.254-263
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• 2015

The failure of hydraulic turbine runners is a rare event. So in order to assess the reliability of these components one cannot rely solely on the number of observed failures in a given population. However, as there is a limited number of degradation mechanisms involved, it is possible to use physically-based reliability models. Such models are often more complicated but are able to account for physical parameters in the degradation process. They can therefore help provide solutions to improve reliability. With such models, the effect of materials properties on runner reliability can be highlighted. This paper presents a brief review of the Kitagawa-Takahashi diagram which links the damage tolerance approach, based on fracture mechanics, to the stress or strain-life approaches. Using simplified response spectra based on runner stress measurements, we will show how fatigue reliability is sensitive to materials fatigue properties, namely fatigue crack propagation behaviour and fatigue limit obtained on S-N curves. Furthermore, we will review the influence of the main microstructural features observed in 13%Cr-4%Ni stainless steels commonly used for runner manufacturing. The goal is ultimately to identify the most influential microstructural features and to quantify their effect on fatigue reliability of runners.

• Journal of Advanced Marine Engineering and Technology
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• v.38 no.10
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• pp.1244-1250
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• 2014

The temperature of the main engine cabin of commercial vessel is very high. The material SS-316L undergoes creep damage at temperatures exceeding $450^{\circ}C$. It is essential to maintain the highly stressed engine cabin below the creep regime. Hence, seawater is employed in this kind of maritime vehicles as cooling liquid. It obtains the thermal energy at the cooling pipe line after passing through main engine cooling system. To harness the energy in the seawater, a turbine can be installed to absorb the energy in the seawater before being released into the sea. In this study, a cooling pipe line is selected to apply the tubular type hydro turbine for transferring the energy. Numerical analysis for investigating the performance and the internal flow characteristics of the tubular turbine is conducted. The results show that the maximum efficiency of 85.8% is achieved although the efficiency drops rapidly at partial flow rate condition. The efficiency descends slowly at the condition of excess flow rate. There is a relatively wide operating range of flow rate of this turbine to keep high efficiency at the excess flow rate condition. For the internal flow of the turbine, there is uniform streamline on the suction and pressure sides of the blade at the design point. However, the secondary flow appears at the suction and pressure sidesat the excess flow rate.In addition, it appears only at pressure side at the partial flow rate condition.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.17 no.4
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• pp.325-331
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• 2016

Computational fluid numerical analysis using the commercial code CFX was performed to develop a Pelton turbine for a pico hydro power generator using the circulating water of a cooling tower in a large building. The performance of the Pelton turbine was examined for different design factors, such as the bucket shape, in which the Pelton wheel was connected in an appropriate manner to the pipe section, and the number of buckets in order to find the optimal design of Pelton turbine for a pico hydro power using surplus water. A benchmark test was carried out on the manufactured small scale Pelton turbine to validate the design method of the Pelton turbine by numerical analysis. The results obtained by comparing the flow characteristics and power output measured using the ultrasonic flowmeter, the pressure transducer and the oscilloscope with the numerical results confirmed the validity of the analytical design method. The possibility of developing Pelton turbines for kW class pico hydro power generators using surplus water with an average circulation velocity of 1.2 m/s for the chosen bucket shape and number of buckets in a 30 m high building was confirmed.

• Journal of Advanced Marine Engineering and Technology
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• v.38 no.10
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• pp.1225-1231
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• 2014

This paper presents the performance characteristic of a Francis hydro turbine with an inline casing. This turbine is designed for city water supply system. Due to large changes in ground elevation with high points and low points, some systems may experience larger-than-normal required pressures in areas with low ground elevations. One way to dissipate these excess pressures is by the use of an inline-turbine instead of an inline-pressure reducing valve. For best applicability and minimal space consumption, the turbine is designed with an inline casing instead of the common spiral casing. As a characteristic of inline casing, the flow accesses to the runner in the radial direction, showing a low efficiency. The installation of vanes improves the internal flow and gives the positive encouragement to the output power. For the power transmission to the outside of the turbine casing from the runner axis, a belt passage is designed in the inline casing, as its influence, the region after the belt passage shows a relatively low output power. The clearance gap in the runner side space is considered, in which a small volume of flow is contracted into the clearance gap, forming the leakage flow. The leakage flow leads to a decrease in the efficiency.

• International Journal of Fluid Machinery and Systems
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• v.7 no.4
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• pp.151-159
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• 2014

Low head hydropower is one of realistic renewable energies. The Darrieus-type hydro turbine with an inlet nozzle is available for such low head conditions because of its simple structure with easy maintenance. Experimental and numerical studies are carried out in order to examine the effects of gap distances between the runner pitch circle and two edges of inlet nozzle on turbine performances. By selecting narrower gaps of left and right edges, the performance could be improved. From the results of two dimensional numerical simulations, the relation between the performance and flow behaviors around the Darrieus blade are discussed to obtain the guideline of appropriate inlet nozzle design.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2009.11a
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• pp.606-609
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• 2009

Development of renewable energy is very important because of environmental problems caused by greenhouse effect. This is due to the use of fossil fuels which has serious consequences. Therefore, development of small hydropower can be a good countermeasure for the problems. The small hydropower is clean energy because the small hydropower generates few $CO_2$. Moreover, as the energy density by the small hydropower is high, it is economical for a society which wants to introduce the system. The purpose of this study is to improve the turbine performance. This study is about tubular-type hydro turbine among renewable energy that is based using the different water pressure level in pipe lines. The analysis was performed using the commercial CFD code ANSYS-CFX.

• International Journal of Fluid Machinery and Systems
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• v.2 no.4
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• pp.353-362
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• 2009

In the process of turbine modernizations, the investigation of the influences of water passage roughness on radial flow machine performance is crucial and validates the efficiency step up between reduced scale model and prototype. This study presents the specific losses per component of a Francis turbine, which are estimated by CFD simulation. Simulations are performed for different water passage surface roughness heights, which represents the equivalent sand grain roughness height. As a result, the boundary layer logarithmic velocity profile still exists for rough walls, but moves closer to the wall. Consequently, the wall friction depends not only on roughness height but also on its shape and distribution. The specific losses are determined by CFD numerical simulations for each component of the prototype, taking into account its own specific sand grain roughness height. The model efficiency step up between reduced scale model and prototype value is finally computed by the assessment of specific losses on prototype and by evaluating specific losses for a reduced scale model with smooth walls. Furthermore, surveys of rough walls of each component were performed during the geometry recovery on the prototype and comparisons are made with experimental data from the EPFL Laboratory for Hydraulic Machines reduced scale model measurements. This study underlines that if rough walls are considered, the CFD approach estimates well the local friction loss coefficient. It is clear that by considering sand grain roughness heights in CFD simulations, its forms a significant part of the global performance estimation. The availability of the efficiency field measurements provides an unique opportunity to assess the CFD method in view of a systematic approach for turbine modernization step up evaluation. Moreover, this paper states that CFD is a very promising tool for future evaluation of turbine performance transposition from the scale model to the prototype.