Equivalent diffusion ratio distribution in the UGT15000 low pressure compressor

Abstract

With spatial and temporal periodicity approach the results of steady state CFD simulation of compressible air flow in each blade-to-blade row of low pressure compressor (LPC) of the UGT15000 gas turbine engine (Ukrainian SSR constr. and prod.) are presented. Near the nominal rotation speed compressor map and adiabatic efficiency of each stage and the flow angles at leading and trailing blade edges are predicted and calculated. At the average radius stage flow and stage load coefficients are determined. It has been established that the reason of the low efficiency of the last stage is associated with the low stage reaction (≈0.5) leading to high airflow swirling at outlet. For LPC optimization a calculation of the radial distributions of the equivalent diffuser coefficient was performed. It is shown that the greatest total pressure losses are in the stator rows of stages 9, 8, 5 and in the rotor rows of stage 9. High losses are also shown on the upper half of the 4th, 3rd, 2nd stator blades and the lower half of the 1st rotor blades. The identified potential for increasing the efficiency of the LPC is up to 2% without significant construction changes.