• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2001.06e
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• pp.625-630
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• 2001

The inducers in liquid-rocket engines are to increase the inlet pressure of the pump to avoid any malfunction due to cavitation. Inducers are typically designed to be operated with some amount of cavitation for the compactness of the turbopump system. Also, inducers are designed to produce low headrise to prevent the decrease of the overall pump efficiency due to the low efficiency of inducers. In the present paper, a computational study on the hydrodynamic behavior of the inducer for the rocket-engine turbopump are presented including the effect of the mass flow rate under the constant rotational speed. As the mass flow rate is decreased, the inducer showed better performance with strong back flows which may have deleterious effects upon the anti-cavitation ability. But the adopted inducer showed very low headrise with high volume flow rates, which may be caused by the small passage area near the trailing edge. The modified version of the present inducer is proposed and numerically evaluated, which in turn showed better results.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers Conference
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• 2009.11a
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• pp.409-412
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• 2009

A 75ton thrust turbopump system for liquid rocket engine was analyzed thermally and mechanically. A 2D axisymmetric model of the turbopump assembly was created. In the analysis operation cycle including chill-down, operation and post operation steps were considered. Appropriate heat transfer conditions for each step were modeled and applied. Transient temperature distribution was calculated, consequent mechanical analysis was conducted to predict stress and deformation. Effects of external heat insulators and heat dissipation at the bearings were considered in the heat transfer analysis.

• The KSFM Journal of Fluid Machinery
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• v.11 no.5
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• pp.37-43
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• 2008

An inducer is employed in a modern rocket feed system because it allows a turbopump system to operate at a high speed with low inlet pressures so as to minimize the weight and the size of the system. Cavitation performance can be improved by installing an inducer to the pump, enabling to increase the operational speed of the pump. The main purpose of an inducer is to increase the static pressure prior to an impeller to enable the impeller to operate satisfactorily under cavitation environments. In the present study the effects of axial distance between the inducer and the impeller on the performance of the pump were studied using both experimental and computational methods. Two inducers with different axial length were used for the experiments and the pump performances were measured. The experimental results show that the suction performance decreases as the axial gap between the inducer and impeller is increased.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers Conference
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• 2003.10a
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• pp.25-28
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• 2003

The bearing/sealing test (BST) facility is intended for tests of bearing and seal for turbopump of liquid rocket engine (LRE) in various media (water, liquid nitrogen, liquid oxygen). The bearing test for serviceability is fulfilled with the estimation of the flow rate of cooling medium through the test bearing separator and with the simulation of axial and(or) radial loading. The purpose of seals test is the determination of magnitude of leakages through the seal and a time variation of this magnitude.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers Conference
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• 2008.05a
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• pp.107-110
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• 2008

The test range for turbopump and gas generator coupled test was determined considering the engine system test area which cover the qualification and development. Based on the test range, we determined the required loss coefficient for the throttle valves and lines.

• The KSFM Journal of Fluid Machinery
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• v.5 no.1 s.14
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• pp.33-41
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• 2002

Low NPSH and high pressure pumps we widely used for turbopump systems, which have an inducer and operate at high rotating speeds. In this paper, a meanline method has been established for the preliminary design and performance prediction of pumps having an inducer for cavitating or non-cavitating conditions at design or off-design points. The method was applied for the performance prediction of a fuel pump. Predicted performances by the method are shown to be in good agreement with experimental results for cavitating and non-cavitating conditions. The established meanline method can be used for the performance prediction and preliminary design of high speed pumps which have a inducer, impeller and volute.

• 유체기계공업학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2001.11a
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• pp.235-242
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• 2001

Hydraulic performance of LCH4 fuel inducer in turbopump system was predicted by 3-D Wavier-stokes calculation. The inducer was designed initially using 1-D method. Different parameters with blade angle and flow coefficient were set from the initial design one, md computation was fulfilled to assess the redesigned models. Especially, influence of inlet back flow on inducer performance and its effective control were explored. The numerical results showed that through reducing inlet back flow strength., the hydraulic efficiency of inducer could be improved up to about $20\%$ compared to that of the initial design one.

• The KSFM Journal of Fluid Machinery
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• v.8 no.2 s.29
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• pp.31-38
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• 2005

A low NPSH and high pressure fuel pump has been designed for a turbopump system. The fuel pump has an axial inducer and a centrifugal impeller. A meanline method has been established for the preliminary design and performance prediction of pumps at design or off-design points. KeRC(Kelyish Research Center) carried out a model testing of the fuel pump with water as a working fluid at the reduced speed. Predicted performances by the method are shown to be in good agreement with experimental results for cavitating and non-cavitating conditions. The established meanline method can be used for the performance prediction and preliminary design of high speed pumps which have a inducer, impeller and volute. In the current study, the three dimensional viscous flow in the fuel pump was investigated through numerical computation. A modified design of the fuel pump was generated to improve pump performance by utilizing CFD results. The modified fuel pump was experimentally tested by ROTEM and KARI(Korea Aerospace Research Institute). The measured non-cavitating and cavitating performance showed a good agreement with designed performance.

• 유체기계공업학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2004.12a
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• pp.341-346
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• 2004

A low NPSH and high pressure fuel pump has been designed for a turbopump system. The fuel pump has an axial inducer and a centrifugal impeller. A meanline method has been established for the preliminary design and performance prediction of pumps at design or off-design points. KeRC carried out a model testing of the fuel pump with water as a working fluid at the reduced speed. Predicted performances by the method are shown to be in good agreement with experimental results for cavitating and non-cavitating conditions. The established meanline method can be used for the performance prediction and preliminary design of high speed pumps which have a inducer, impeller and volute. In the current study, the three dimensional viscous flow in the fuel pump was investigated through numerical computation. A modified design of the fuel pun was generated to improve pump performance by utilizing CFD results. The modified fuel pump was experimentally tested by ROTEM and KARI. The measured non-cavitating and cavitating performance showed a good agreement with designed performance.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
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• v.34 no.4
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• pp.70-75
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• 2006

The performance of a turbopump system composed of an inducer, an impeller, a volute and seals has been computationally analyzed. To save the computational time, only one flow passage of the inducer and impeller is considered for the computations. A steady mixing-plane method is used on the impeller/volute interface for simulating the unsteady interaction phenomena. The axial thrust is predicted from the turbopump calculation in its entirety, which is necessary for such estimation. Moreover, the effects of each component on the pump performance are investigated at a design condition through the analysis of flow structures. The predicted performance is in good agreement with experimental data in terms of head rise, efficiency and volute wall pressure distributions despite of highly complex flow structures being present. The computational results also show that the axial and radial thrusts are within the design limit although corresponding experimental measurements were not taken.