Comparative Study of the Flow and Thermal Characteristics of Non-Stochastic Lattice and Bio-Inspired Multi-Scale Structures for Gas Turbine Engine Applications

Abstract

Abstract Metal Additive Manufacturing has presented gas turbine designers with additional design tools such as cellular solids. However, there is limited research on the early selection of these structures and how these structures interact with flows. Lattice structures are known for their capability to be tailored for achieving specific properties such as high porosity and strength, impact energy absorption, and light-weighting. A literature survey has shown that the mechanical performance of the strut-based and surface-based lattice structures has already been investigated in the past. However, very little research has been conducted to investigate their flow and heat transfer performance, especially for strut-based lattice structures. This research systematically investigates the friction factor and convective heat transfer (CHT) coefficient across strut and surface-based lattice structures. Results show that the complex shape of the Triply Periodic Minimal Surface (TPMS) lattice structure topologies give the flow a better capability to mix and recirculate for convection at the expense of a significant pressure drop. However, topologies with less pressure drop/friction factor and high convective heat transfer coefficient are more suitable for gas turbine engines. Furthermore, this paper investigates the use of newly developed multifunctional bio-inspired design method called as Domain Integrated Design (DID) for an innovative concept to achieve low pressure drop and high effective heat transfer. Comparative study shows that bio-inspired designs have achieved low friction factor as compared to the lattice structures whereas TPMS structures shows better convective heat transfer performance.