• International Journal of Fluid Machinery and Systems
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• v.3 no.3
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• pp.260-270
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• 2010

Reducing the losses of the tip clearance flow is one of the keys in an unshrouded centrifugal compressor design and development because tip clearances are large in relation to the span of the blades and also centrifugal compressors produce a sufficiently large pressure rise in single stage. This problem is more acute for a low flow high-pressure ratio impeller design. The large tip clearance would cause flow separations, and as a result it would drop both the efficiency and surge margin. Thus a design of a high efficiency and wide operation range low flow coefficient centrifugal compressor is a great challenge. This paper describes a recent development of high efficiency and wide surge margin low flow coefficient centrifugal compressor. A viscous turbomachinery optimal design method developed by the authors for axial flow machine was further extended and used in the centrifugal compressor design. The compressor has three main parts: impeller, a low solidity diffuser and volute. The tip clearance is under a special consideration in this design to allow impeller insensitiveness to the clearance. A patented three-dimensional low solidity diffuser design method is used and applied to this design. The compressor test results demonstrated to be successful to extend the low solidity diffusers to high-pressure ratio compressor. The compressor stage performance showed the total to static efficiency of the compressor being about 85% and stability range over 35%. The test results are in good agreement with the design.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers B
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• v.40 no.10
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• pp.645-651
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• 2016

Effects of pressure-side winglet width on the tip leakage flow and aerodynamic loss downstream of a turbine blade with a pressure-side squealer rim have been investigated for the tip gap-to-span ratio of h/s = 1.36%. The pressure-side squealer has a fixed height-to-span ratio of $h_p/s=3.75%$ and the pressure-side winglet, which is installed at an elevation of tip surface, has width-to-pitch ratios of w/p = 2.64%, 5.28%, 7.92% and 10.55%. The results show that with increasing w/p, aerodynamic loss in the passage vortex region decreases, whereas that in the leakage flow region increases. As a result, the mass-averaged loss coefficient all over the measurement plane tends to decrease minutely with the increment of w/p. It is concluded that the pressure-side winglet for the pressure-side squealer tip can hardly contribute to the tip-leakge loss reduction.