On the Significance of Turbulence Models and Unsteady Effect on the Flow Prediction through A High Pressure Turbine Cascade

Abstract

Unsteady flow simulations through a transonic turbine vane were carried out for an isentropic Mach number of 1.02 and a Reynolds number of 106. The main objective of the study is to investigate the effect of unsteadiness due to vortex shedding on the flow in transonic regime. The steady and the time-averaged unsteady results by employing three different turbulence models: shear stress transport (SST), k-ω, and ω Reynolds stress models were compared. The comparisons were emphasized on the isentropic Mach number along the blade and total pressure loss at the cascade exit. The results showed that both steady and unsteady calculations have good agreement with experimental data along the blade surface. However, at cascade exit, the unsteady calculations have much better agreement with experimental data than steady calculations. Based on these, we conclude that the unsteady flow calculations are essential for these types of problems.