Axial Turbine Design

[Jörg 29]

There is a new video available that briefly discusses the basic design concepts of how to model an axial turbine in CAESES. Here is the link:

 

VIDEO: Axial Turbine Design

 

The video focuses on the design of turbine blades in the context of shape optimization with simulation tools. The flow domain is part of the model so that automated meshing and a tight integration into existing workflows is possible. These are the relevant steps:

 

1. Define parametric hub and shroud contours
2. Define parametric stacking axis (optional)
3. Define custom 2D profiles with a set of parameters
4. Create function graphs i.e. distributions for these 2D parameters
5. Create the blade surface from these previous inputs (profile, sweep and casing information)
6. Derive a parametric flow domain geometry (readily available as a feature)
7. Apply additional colors to the domain patches for having fixed identifiers in downstream meshing tools (ready, but can be customized)

 

The blade and domain generation can then be automated by using the integrated optimization strategies (e.g. DoE, NSGA-II, MOGA, response surfaces etc.). Alternatively, 3rd party optimization tools can also be used so that CAESES runs in the background as a CAD engine (batch mode option).

 

If you are an ANSYS user, you can utilize the CAESES App (available in the ANSYS app store) to bring CAESES into the ANSYS Workbench user interface.

 

In case you are using NUMECA's FINE/Turbo together with CAESES, then check out the geomturbo features for automating the data exchange between the tools.

 

I hope this is some useful information for designers of axial turbine blades.

 

Cheers

Joerg