Numerical Investigation on Effect of Compressor Performance in Single Rotor With Micro-Vortex Generator

Abstract

The performance of axial compressor is considerably influenced by secondary flow, like corner separation between wall and blade in a compressor stage. An extensive experimental study of vortex generator (VG) applied on axial compressor was conducted by many scholars, in order to control these effects and improve the aerodynamic performance. According to their size, they are classified as traditional VGs (h/δ>0.5) and Micro-vortex generators (MVGs, h/δ = 0.1∼0.5).MVGs is one of the hot spots of present research to restrain the secondary flow. In order to investigate the effect of MVGs used in rotor, this study was carried out on Northwestern Polytecnical University rotor (NPU rotor), which is a subsonic axial flow compressor rotor. The Vane-MVGs were placed at a distance of 11% chord length ahead of the leading edge on the end-wall. The characteristic line of 54% (8130RPM), 71% (10792RPM) and 84% (12768RPM) design speed were calculated by steady 3D RANS simulations with Spalart-Allmar turbulence model and compared with the corresponding MVGs cases, respectively. Results show that the stall margins of the 3 speeds with MVGs were larger than baseline, but the efficiency and pressure ratio were reduced in different degrees. In this paper, the flow characteristics at 54% (8130RPM) design speed and the development process of vortex generated by MVGs are analyzed in detail. The influence of MVGs height and stagger angle on rotor performance is also discussed. Moreover, flow simulation of MVGs used on axial compressor single rotor’s hub offered a guideline to future research.