Rotor Design to Attenuate Flow Distortion—Part I: A Semiactuator Disk Analysis

The transfer of stationary circumferential inlet distortion through a rotor is analyzed using unsteady semiactuator disk cascade theory. This method models the blade cascade as one-dimensional wave guides and describes the transmission characteristics of a rotor to be a function of the distortion wave length and the length of the rotor chord, as well as the normal design parameters. Two parametric studies on the response of a loaded rotor to inlet distortions are done for a single rotor operating at off design conditions and a number of rotors operating at their design points. Fourier series representations of arbitrary distortion wave shapes are used for comparison with experimental data.