Time-Accurate Predictions for a Fully Cooled High-Pressure Turbine Stage—Part I: Comparison of Predictions With Data

The aerodynamics of a fully cooled axial single stage high-pressure turbine operating at design corrected conditions of corrected speed, flow function, and stage pressure ratio has been investigated. This paper focuses on flow field predictions obtained from the viewpoint of a turbine designer using the computational fluid dynamics (CFD) codes Numeca’s FINE/TURBO and the code TURBO. The predictions were all performed with only knowledge of the stage operating conditions, but without knowledge of the surface pressure measurements. Predictions were obtained with and without distributed cooling flow simulation. The FINE/TURBO model was run in 3-D viscous steady and time-accurate modes; the TURBO model was used to provide only 3-D viscous time-accurate results. Both FINE/TURBO and TURBO utilized phase-lagged boundary conditions to simplify the time-accurate model and to significantly reduce the computing time and resources. The time-accurate surface pressure loadings and steady state predictions are compared to measurements for the blade, vane, and shroud as time-averaged, time series, and power spectrum data. The measurements were obtained using The Ohio State University Gas Turbine Laboratory Turbine Test Facility. The time-average and steady comparisons of measurements and predictions are presented for 50% span on the vane and blade. Comparisons are also presented for several locations along the blade to illustrate local differences in the CFD behavior. The comparisons for the shroud are made across the blade passage at axial blade chord locations corresponding to the pressure transducer locations. The power spectrum decompositions of individual transducers (based on the fast Fourier transform (FFT)) are also included to lend insight into the unsteady nature of the flow. The comparisons show that both computational tools are capable of providing reasonable aerodynamic predictions for the vane, blade, and stationary shroud. The CFD model predictions show the encouraging trend of improved matching to the experimental data with increasing model fidelity from mass averaged to distributed cooling flow inclusion and as the codes change from steady to time-accurate modes.