Experimental and Comparative RANS/URANS Investigations on the Effect of Radius of Volute Tongue on the Aerodynamics and Aeroacoustics of a Sirocco Fan

Abstract

The geometry of volute tongue is crucial in the design of Sirocco fans. The size of the volute tongue determines its relative position and distance from the impeller which affects the local flow characteristics and thus the aerodynamic and aeroacoustic performances of the fan. In this work, we performed experimental and numerical investigations on the effect of volute tongue radius on the aerodynamic and aeroacoustic characteristics of a Sirocco fan. The internal flow characteristics are analyzed and discussed in terms of the spatial distribution and temporal variation of pressure and streamlines, the pulsating behaviors of pressure both in the impeller and on the volute surface with emphasis in the volute tongue region, the variation of passage flow with the rotation of impeller and the aeroacoustic features of the fan. We conducted numerical simulations using both steady Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) and unsteady Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes (URANS) approaches with realizable k-ε turbulence model with rotation effect correction and the results are compared against the experimental data to assess the prediction capability and accuracy in qualitative and quantitative manners. Experimental and numerical results show that as the volute tongue radius increases, the static pressure rises as well as the far-field noise of the fan and pronounced fluctuation of flow is observed within the whole impeller and volute; the reversed flow in the passage of the impeller is reduced and the high-pressure region is found to be moving towards the outlet of the volute. The decreasing radius also enlarges the size of the adverse pressure gradient (APG) region on the volute tongue which contributes to the formation of recirculating flow. The comparative RANS and URANS simulations reveal that both approaches produce generally consistent results regarding the time-averaged flow although the URANS data are much closer to those of the experimental ones. However, the fluctuating flow which is not capable to be modeled by RANS still dominates for the present configuration and thus URANS is necessary for the accurate prediction of the flow details.