A study of angle parametric optimization of the composite honeycomb on turbine blade tip

Abstract

To reduce the secondary flow loss of the high-pressure turbine caused by the tip leakage flow, the design of the composite honeycomb tip has been experimentally and numerically examined in this study. The arrangement angle of the composite honeycomb is defined and optimized using the radial basis function and genetic algorithm. The tip flow field of the high-pressure turbine blade with a 2.128 mm clearance is simulated by CFX 18.0, and the arrangement angle of the composite honeycomb is optimized to obtain a lower loss. Moreover, the flat tip, basic honeycomb tip, and optimized honeycomb tip are tested in a low-speed cascade test facility. The results show that the vortices and radial velocity induced by the honeycomb structure cavity increase the kinetic energy loss of the leakage flow and reduce the leakage flow rate. Compared with the basic honeycomb, the optimized honeycomb has a supplemental blocking effect on the tip leakage flow by reducing the crosswise pressure gradient in the blade tip. The optimized honeycomb also changes the outlet angle of the leakage flow in the tip clearance, reduces the leakage vortex, and the total pressure loss is further reduced by 2.5%.