Advanced Turbomachinery

Simulation using STAR-CCM+

Chad Custer, PhD
Technical Specialist
Outline

STAR-CCM+ is a robust tool well suited for many types of

turbomachinery simulation
Today’s talk will focus on just a few key objectives and capabilities

Key Objectives
– Conjugate heat transfer
– Aeroelastic response
– Performance mapping

Key Capabilities
– Complex geometry handling
– Conformal polyhedral meshing
– Pipelined workflow
– Harmonic balance
– Advanced post-processing
Conjugate Heat Transfer

Key Capabilities
Geometry handling
– Direct CAD import
– 3D CAD editing
Meshing
– Polyhedral cells
– Conformal interfaces
– Automatic prism layer generation
Cooled Turbine Blade

Key Capabilities
Geometry handling
– Direct CAD import
– 3D CAD editing

Direct import of CAD

solid geometry

External and cooling air

volumes generated
using 3D CAD
Cooled Turbine Blade

Key Capabilities
Meshing
– Automatic mesh generation

• Pipelined meshing
• Simple global size settings
• Local refinement control
• Automatic solution interpolation
Cooled Turbine Blade

Fewer cells required

Key Capabilities
Meshing
– Automatic mesh generation
– Polyhedral cells
Cooled Turbine Blade

Key Capabilities Good for swirling flow

Meshing such as tip vortices
– Automatic mesh generation
– Polyhedral cells

Polyhedral cell faces are orthogonal to the flow

regardless of flow direction
Cooled Turbine Blade

Key Capabilities High quality cells, even

Meshing with complex geometry
– Automatic mesh generation
– Polyhedral cells
Cooled Turbine Blade

Key Capabilities
Meshing
– Automatic mesh generation
– Polyhedral cells
– Conformal interfaces
– Automatic prism layer generation

Cells are one-to-one

connected on the
solid/fluid interface

Fluid-side prism layers are

automatically generated
CHT Validation: NASA C3X Cooled Vane

The C3X is commonly used to validate heat transfer simulation

Structured and unstructured (polyhedral) grids with and without
transition modeling are analyzed
Other work has been performed on the C3X using STAR-CCM+ by
– Solar Turbines (GT2006-91109)
– Honeywell (GT2012-68861)
Polyhedral Grid

1.0 million polyhedral cells

Extruded cell topology in the span-
wise direction
y+ of less than one
Structured Grid

1.0 million cells

y+ less than one
HTC sensitivity to Inlet Turbulent Viscosity Ratio

Heat transfer coefficient is sensitive to inlet turbulent viscosity

ratio
TVR=10 TVR=70

TVR=40 TVR=100
Structured Grid: HTC for γ-Reθ Transition
model

Solutions produced with STAR-CCM+ correlate more closely to

experiment than reference simulations

Hylton, L.D., Mihelc, M.S., Turner, E.R., Nealy, D.A., York, R.E., “Analytical and
Experimental Evaluation of the hHeat Transfer Distribution over the Surfaces of
Turbines Blades”, NASA CR 168015, May 1983
Comparison of Mesh Solutions

Structured and polyhedral mesh solutions correlate well

Polyhedral Structured
Comparison of Heat Transfer Coefficient: No
Transition

Polyhedral mesh correlates more closely with experiment when

transition is not considered

Polyhedral Structured

Polyhedral Structured
Comparison of Heat Transfer Coefficient: With
Transition

Polyhedral mesh and structured grid produce comparable

results when transition is considered

Polyhedral Structured
C3X Conclusions

STAR-CCM+ accurately predicts surface pressure and heat

transfer
Transition modeling is important in accurately modeling heat
transfer
Polyhedral mesh shown to correlate more closely with
experiment than structured grid
Polyhedral meshing technology allows conformal meshing of
complex geometries
 • Simulations are being performed on the GE
Energy efficient engine
• All Cooling holes and internal geometry is
modeled

GE Energy Efficient Engine

Aeroelastic Response

Traditional simulation methods present many challenges

Aeroelastic analysis must be run unsteady
Traditional unsteady simulation is challenging
– Very long run times
– Must mesh the entire machine
– Hard to specify blade vibration
– Hard to extract stability information

• Harmonic balance method in STAR-CCM+

resolves each of these challenges
• The HB method is not available in any other
commercial package
Harmonic Balance Basics

The harmonic balance method takes advantage of the periodic

nature of a turbomachine

Solves a set of equations that converge to the periodic,

unsteady solution

Full non-linear solver

All unsteady interactions captured

Harmonic Balance Key Benefits

Rapid calculation of unsteady solution

Unsteady simulation must be run for many time steps to
converge
HB simulation converges to the unsteady solution 10x faster

Red: Time Domain

Blue: Harmonic Balance
Harmonic Balance Key Benefits

Single blade passage mesh

All blades must be meshed for an unsteady simulation
Only one blade passage must be meshed for a HB simulation,
however the solution is calculated for all blades
Time Domain Harmonic Balance
Harmonic Balance Key Benefits

Specify blade vibration

– The vibration of each blade is staggered.
This is known as the “Interblade phase
angle”
– To determine stability a simulation must
be run for each phase angle
– Traditional unsteady solvers require
manual set up of motion for each phase
angle
– HB solver takes the inter-blade phase
angle as a simple parameter
Example: D2 Vane Flutter

Small vane motion results in large unsteady response

Unsteady Pressure (Pa)

Example: D2 Vane Flutter

Simulation run for many inter-blade phase angles

If the work done on the blade is negative for all inter-blade
phase angles, the vane is dynamically stable
Performance Mapping

Key Benefits
Complex geometry handling
Polyhedral cells
High quality mesh Already discussed
Prism layer generation
Harmonic balance solver
Grid sequencing initialization
Efficiency optimization with Optimate+
Turbomachinery specific post-processing
Performance Mapping

Key Benefits • Drastically reduce run time

Grid sequencing initialization
Time to initialization:
80 seconds
• Reduce need for ramping
• Increased simulation
robustness

Initialization Converged Solution

Performance Mapping

Key Benefits
Efficiency optimization with Optimate+
Performance Mapping

Key Benefits
Turbomachinery specific post-processing

Blade-to-blade
projection
Performance Mapping

Key Benefits
Turbomachinery specific post-processing

Meridional
projection
Performance Mapping

Key Benefits
Turbomachinery specific post-processing

Circumferential
Averaging
Example: Aachen Turbine Performance Analysis

Aachen turbine is a 1.5 stage cold-flow turbine

Simulations will be performed using the harmonic balance
method implemented within STAR-CCM+
Analysis will be performed for two different vane clocking
positions of +1 degree and -3 degrees

-3o
Computational Domain

Structured HOH mesh containing 1.85 million cells

Near-wall cell thickness of 0.03 mm
8 cells resolve 0.4 mm tip gap
Residuals

HB solver converges to the unsteady solution

Mid-span Entropy

Wakes resolved across interfaces

-3o
Unsteady Rotor Blade Loading

Time domain and harmonic balance solutions correlate well

Velocity Magnitude

Unsteady wake interaction captured

 3
Local Efficiency

-3o
 3
Local Efficiency

+1o
 3
Time Averaged Local Efficiency

-3o +1o
 3
Circ. Averaged Local Efficiency

-3o +1o
Aachen Turbine Conclusions

HB solver able to calculate the unsteady solution in 1/60th the

compute time as a time domain trial (GT2012-69690)

Allows for clocking studies to be performed:

– Efficiency of +1 degree clocking: 84.609%
– Efficiency of -3 degree clocking: 84.663%

Data can be visualized easily in the time domain or frequency

domain
Overview

STAR-CCM+ is a robust tool well suited for many types of

turbomachinery simulation
Today’s talk focused on just a few key objectives and
capabilities

Key Objectives
– Conjugate heat transfer
– Aeroelastic response
– Performance mapping

Key Capabilities
– Complex geometry handling
– Conformal polyhedral meshing
– Pipelined workflow
– Harmonic balance
– Advanced post-processing