Classic design of a kaplan turbine runner wheel

Abstract

The Brazilian electric matrix is based on renewable sources of energy, and most of it comes from hydroelectric power plants, its structure is composed of a dam, a capture system, a spillway, and a powerhouse, in this installation are the water turbines The main types are Francis, Bulbo, Helix, Kaplan, and Pelton each one has particularity for dimensioning. In this context, the objective of the article is to carry out the classic design of a Kaplan turbine runner wheel and the computational design. For this, first, the runner wheel case study was defined considering those installed in Brazil, using as criteria the power energy efficiency. Later, based on the input data: flow, fall height, and runner rotation, the calculation memorial was developed, preliminary calculations to define the specific rotation, complementary calculations to determine the minimum runner flow, number of poles, specific design rotation, an outer diameter of the runner blade, hub diameter, the height of the distributor, solid shaft diameter, fluid flow velocity, profile lengths, and profile thickness. The Hydroelectric Power Plant case study was Luis Eduardo Magalhães, installed on the Tocantins River in the state of Tocantins, has five generator units with Kaplan runners of five blades and power of 180.5 MW each, the flow rate of 700 m³/s, drop height of 29 m and 100 revolutions per minute. The values obtained were organized in electronic spreadsheets and later the computational design of the runner was performed using CAD software. The dimensioned runner wheel has dimensional and power values similar to the case study. Thus, it is concluded that the application of the classic dimensioning allowed the design of the runner wheel containing five blades and power of 183.4 MW, and the computational design allowed us to visualize the similarities with the case study.