7th National Aeronautical Conference, 26th ~ 27th March, 1995 : PAF Academy, Risalpur – Pakistan

ROTATING STALL IN AXIAL FLOW COMPRESSORS

Wing Commander Muhammad Ismail

College of Aeronautical Engineering
PAF Academy Risalpur Cantt – Pakistan
dqa.nust@gmail.com

Abstract. Ever increasing demand of higher pressure ratio of aero-engine

compressors has always been hindered by two distinct aerodynamic instabilities.
The first known as surge is; large one dimensional periodic mass flow fluctuation
through the compressor, which involves the entire pumping system including
compressor, ducting, plenum and throttle. The second is the rotating stall which can
be characterized by a wave travelling about the circumference of the machine. It is
local to the blade rows of the compressor and can lead to the surge. Both these
instabilities can reduce the pressure rise in the compressor, cause over-heating of
the blades and can result in severe mechanical damage to the machine. The
researchers have been trying to fully resolve these complex phenomena but many
aspects are still unsolved problems. In the case of rotating stall, the efforts to predict
its inception and analyse the flow during and after its occurrence have met with
limited success. Some passive techniques such as rotor casing treatment and
employment of flow distortion control screen are already in use to delay the rotating
stall. Recently, successful laboratory experiments have been conducted regarding
the active suppression and control of the stall and for the bifurcation analysis of the
stall and surge in axial compressors.

INTRODUCTION

1. The investigation for the complete understanding of rotating stall in the axial
flow compressor has been carried out since the advent of this machine. Initiation of
such a stall can be associated with several types of fluid instabilities. Theoretical
explanation for the occurrence of the phenomenon was given by Emmons at el. [1]
through two different flow models, back in 1955, which formed the basis of most of
the later theoretical and experimental research.

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7th National Aeronautical Conference, 26th ~ 27th March, 1995 : PAF Academy, Risalpur – Pakistan

2. This paper presents a review of the efforts made to analyse the rotating stall and the
work that has been undertaken to develop the techniques to avoid, suppress or control it.
Day [2] has used both the flow models basically suggested by Emmons at el. to explain the
inception of rotating stall experimentally in 1993. Significant improvements to the stall
margin of the axial compressor have been obtained by the use of inlet flow distortion
control screen and rotor casing treatment. However, the usefulness of these techniques is
limited. In case of aircraft engines, the inlet flow distortion has a strong influence on the
compressor flow stability. Since this distortion can be correlated with aircraft angle of
attack and yaw angle, therefore, the aircraft flight control and engine fuel are coupled to
continually adjust the engine operating point so as to avoid the compressor stall. Since
these techniques achieve the stall control by simply unloading the compressor, hence they
are termed as stall avoidance measures.

3. In order to develop the active controls, which can affect the unsteady aerodynamic
damping in the compressor, Day [3] and Paduano at el. [4] have developed successful
laboratory techniques for the active suppression and active control of the compressor stall,
respectively. However, the improvement of these techniques and their general application
is still an on going effort.

ROTATING STALL IN AXIAL COMPRESSORS

4. Aerodynamic Stall. The phenomenon of progressive breakdown of lift

producing airflow around an airfoil is called the stall. Basically, it occurs due to the
separation of boundary layer from the surface of airfoil. This separation may occur as a
long or short bubble (separation region) on the surface of the airfoil, or at the beginning of
a wake emanating from its trailing edge. For an airfoil of thick trailing edge, there is
always a separated region at the trailing edge and boundary layer in this region is turbulent.
When the airfoil loading increases above a certain level, the flow separation dominates the
flow field, giving a gradual stall (Fig.1).

5. Rotating Stall in Axial Compressors. The stator and rotor of an axial flow
compressor are also cascades of airfoils. If a blade row (usually a rotor) of a compressor
reaches the stall point the blades, instead of all stalling together, stall in separate patches
(or cells). These patches travel around the compressor annulus (i.e. they rotate) leading to
the term “rotating or prorogating” stall. The rotation of the patches can be well understood
with the help of Fig. 2, originally drawn by Emmons et al. [1].

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7th National Aeronautical Conference, 26th ~ 27th March, 1995 : PAF Academy, Risalpur – Pakistan

6. As the loading of a diffusing blade row approaches the stall level, small
geometrical differences of flow disturbances tend to cause a single blade stall first.
The stall of the initiating blade A creates a blockage of the passage bounded by the
suction surface A and the pressure surface of adjacent blade B. Due to this blockage
‘cell’, oncoming air will be deflected towards blades Z and C. This will cause an
increase of incidence onto blade B and subsequently on C but blade Z will be
subjected to a more negative incidence than would have otherwise occurred. Since
the blades were already at the verge of stall, blade B will also do exactly that and
passage BC will be blocked. Oncoming air will be deflected to lower the incidence
of blade A tending to unstall that blade and to unblock passage AB. Now the
incidence on the blade C becomes more positive and that blade will then stall. In this
manner the stall cell will continue to propagate along cascade blades. The
propagation speed of the cell is always lower than the rotational speed of the blades
and, although the stall cell will move to the right relative to the rotor blades in this
picture, both cell and blades move to the left in the absolute frame of reference.

7. Types of Rotating Stall. The two distinct types of the rotating stall as
reported by Breugelmans et al. [5] are described below:

(a) Small Stall. It occurs when small velocity fluctuations appear

around a mean flow. During this stall, the performance of the compressor
gradually drops but the flow continues through rotor without significant radial
reorganization.

(b) Big (Deep) Stall. This type of stall involves large velocity and angle
fluctuations in compressor. During this stall, some flow is ejected upstream of
the rotors and is recirculated. The flow is completely reorganized in three
dimensional manner and performance drops abruptly.

8. Deep Rotating Stall Cell Flow Field. Many experiments have been
conducted to measure and interpret the flow within the deep rotating stall cell (being
more important than small stall cell) in the axial compressors. Some important
conclusions of such studies by Mathiodakis et al. [6] and Day et al. [7] are being
listed below:

(a) The stall cell is axial through the machine; it does not form a helix.

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7th National Aeronautical Conference, 26th ~ 27th March, 1995 : PAF Academy, Risalpur – Pakistan

(b) During a deep stall there is a return flow with high tangential velocity
upstream of the rotor and a slowly moving flow behind it. The upstream return
flow has character of a jet emerging from the rotor, whereas the downstream
flow can be described by a jet and a wake region.

(c) Unstalled flow crosses the stall cell tangentially, because the stall cell
speeds are always less than half the blade speeds. However, the unstalled flow
does not cross the stall cell in the gaps between the blades. Tip stall rotors
generally have lower stall propagating velocities than rotors stalling at other
spanwise sections and the shape of the blade’s nose is a predominant feature.

(d) The flow in the stall cell is three dimensional, especially during full-
span flow. Radial velocities in the cell are much smaller than the axial and
circumferential components.

(e) The centrifugal effects in the stalled flow ahead of the rotor blades
contribute to the increase in static pressure ahead of each rotor. The
circumferential static pressure gradient between the stalled and unstalled parts
of the flow can be very large.

(e) Speed of rotation of full-span stall cell increases rapidly with the
number of stages in the compressor, but the cell structure remains unaffected
by the cell speed.

9. Effects of Rotating Stall. The rotating stall being a distinct aerodynamic

instability has the following adverse effects on the compressor and engine cycle:

(a) The rotating stall limits the pressure rise capability (performance) of
axial flow compressor (Fig. 3) and overall gas turbine engine cycle may not
remain self-sustained.

(b) In an engine the greatly decreased mass flow through the system (due to
the stalled compressor) may also cause turbine overheating.

(c) The rotating stall may lead to the excessive blade vibrations by
periodically loading and unloading the cascade blades. The frequency of
vibrations depends upon the speed and number of stall cells and if it becomes
equal to natural frequency the blade failure may occur resulting in a serious
damage to the whole compressor.

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7th National Aeronautical Conference, 26th ~ 27th March, 1995 : PAF Academy, Risalpur – Pakistan

10. Bifurcation of the Surge and Rotating Stall. A very important question
about an axial compressor is that whether it will exhibit surge or rotating stall while
experiencing some flow instability. Greitzer [8] analysed the linear compression
system model and concluded that for a given compressor system there is a non
dimensional parameter on which the system response depends. This parameter is
denoted as B:

B = (U/2a) [Vp/(Ac Lc)]1/2 (1)

where a is the speed of sound, U is the rotor speed, Ac is the compressor

flow-through area, Lc is the effective length of the compressor duct, and Vp is
the plenum volume. For a given compressor characteristics there is a critical
value of B which determines whether the mode of instability will be surge or
rotating stall. Systems with B above the critical value will exhibit surge
oscillations, while those having B lower than critical value will undergo an
initial transient to the steady flow.

11. In a recent study of the subject Abed at el. [9], using the same compression
system as used by Gritzer, uncovered a sequence of local and global bifurcation of
large amplitude periodic solutions. Resulting from this bifurcation are a stable
oscillation (surge) and an unstable oscillation (anti-surge). The anti anti-surge
oscillations exist for a large range of values of parameter B, and the position of the
initial condition relative to this oscillation is a decisive factor in determining post-
instability behavior.

12. Post Stall Transients. Greitzer at el. [10] has developed an approximate
two-dimensional theory for general post stall transients in axial compression system
to show the evolution of mass flow, pressure rise, and rotating-stall cell amplitude
during compression. Analysis shows that surge and rotating stall can both exist in
pure or equilibrium form. During either equilibrium surge or rotating stall, small
amplitude disturbances of the other family tend to die out. According to this study
the amplitude of the rotating stall cell during unsteady flow is different from that
during steady-state operation in rotating stall, hence the instantaneous compressor
performance differs in the two cases. It is also shown that the final mode of the
system response, surge or stable rotating stall, depends not only on the B parameter,
but also on the compressor length-to-radius ratio. The large values of B tend to
favour the occurrence of surge, as do the small values of the later quantity.

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7th National Aeronautical Conference, 26th ~ 27th March, 1995 : PAF Academy, Risalpur – Pakistan

Stall inception in Axial Compressors

13. Prediction of Rotating Stall. The problem of prediction of the point at

which stall occurs has been attacked by many investigators who have developed
several empirical correlations based on quite different levels of approach. In this
endeavor, the basic concept has been to find a parameter (or parameters) which
correlates the onset of stall for a number of different blade geometries, compressor
designs, etc. Several of the correlations of this sort are found in literature but one of
the well-known examples of such correlations, which is much in use, was given by
Leiblein. He developed a parameter which is called diffusion factor (or D-factor),
D. It was related to the adverse pressure gradient to which the boundary layer on the
suction surface of the airfoil was subjected and defined as

D = 1- (W2/ W1) + [∆Wθ/(2σW1 )] (2)

where W1 is the inlet relative velocity, W2 is the exit relative velocity, Wθ is

the change in circumferential velocity component and σ is the solidity.

14. It was found that total pressure loss correlates with D quite well and sharp rise
occurs in loss as D increases beyond a value of roughly 0.6 which is taken an
approximate criterion for the onset of stall. Besides, the limiting D-factor tends to
decrease as the aspect ratio and / or the non-dimensional tip clearance decreases.
Moreover, several other factors (such as Reynolds number, tolerances and
deteriorations etc), which can have the effect on the stall point, are also accounted
for in practice by using correlations. Various approaches to the stall prediction
problem are divided into two types: linearized (small disturbance) stability analysis
for predicting the onset of rotating stall, and non-linear treatments which follow the
growth of small perturbations to a fully developed (finite amplitude) state. These
approaches are explained further with the help of following flow models.

Flow Model 1. This flow model is derived from Fig. 2, which suggests a
possible cause of stall inception and gives an explanation of how the stall cell
propagates along the blade row. Here stall cell such as this needs only to affect
the flow around a few blade passages and can be considered as a disturbance
of short length.

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7th National Aeronautical Conference, 26th ~ 27th March, 1995 : PAF Academy, Risalpur – Pakistan

Flow Model 2. In this model, which was also suggested by Emmons et al.
[1], the flow field is supposed to be disturbed so that the additional flow
passes through certain sections of the compressor and lesser through others.
The small sinusoidal velocity fluctuations (sometimes called prestall waves)
are considered to rotate about the annulus at a steady speed. Here a velocity
perturbation with a wave length equal to the circumferential length of the
annulus is referred to as a mode of Order 1 (Fig. 4). The blades and
perturbation both move to left, however, the speed of the perturbation is lesser
than that of blade. In this view such a perturbation would grow or decay
depending upon the stability criteria related to the operating point of the
compressor. If the compressor was to be throttled toward the stall point, then
perturbation would grow in intensity, without any abrupt change in either
amplitude or frequency, until a fully developed stall cell is formed. Initially
the wave amplitude would be very small and not discernible above the
background noise, but as the instability point is approached growth of wave
would be rapid, and compressor would appear to stall instantaneously.

15. Experimental Verification. To investigate the process leading to the

formation of finite amplitude rotating cells and a subsequent occurrence of stall, Day
[2] tested both of the above mentioned flow models experimentally, and concluded
the following points:

(a) The disturbances of a shorter length scale (flow model 1) have their
effect on cell formation in the majority of the cases tested.

(b) The model perturbations (flow mode 2) actually exist prior to stall and
ultimately they become stall cell. However, they are not the only path into
stall.

(c) The model perturbation oscillations and the formation of finite stall cell
are separate and physically different events. These two events are not
necessarily consecutive, but both are developed near the limit of the pressure
rise characteristics and either one might be first to appear.

(d) If the finite stall cell appears first in compressor, the symmetry of the
flow field is rapidly destroyed and modal oscillations don’t develop. If a
modal oscillation develops prior to the formation of finite stall cell, the
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7th National Aeronautical Conference, 26th ~ 27th March, 1995 : PAF Academy, Risalpur – Pakistan

oscillations may influence the stalling process depending upon the size of the
cell when it forms. When the stall cell formation occurs in the already
established modal flow field, some measure of coupling between these two
phenomena may occur.

(e) A modal oscillation is disturbance of circumferential properties

superimposed on a fundamentally axisymmetric flow field. It is a reversible
disturbance which can be made to come and go by slight changes in throttle
setting and may be seen in the machine for as much as 200 rotor revolutions
before stall. Whereas, an emerging stall cell is localized irreversible
disturbance which once formed will lead inexorably to a collapse of the
pressure rise, usually within 4 to 6 rotor revolutions. However, it is the initial
emergence and subsequent spreading of a short length scale disturbance that is
the most likely route into fully developed stall.

Stability Enhancement of Axial Compressor

16. To avoid the dangers presented by rotating stall (and surge), the compressor
should be restricted to an operating point safely removed from stability boundary.
However, this boundary is poorly defined as it is affected by engine acceleration,
inlet distortion, and deterioration with age. Various techniques for suppressing or
controlling the rotating stall are either in use or being developed.

17. The passive flow control may be carried out by using the screens to control
the flow disturbance entering the compressor and by rotor casing treatment. The
former technique can result in 15 to 20% increase in stable flow range as well as an
increase in peak pressure rise. The rotor casing treatment as discussed by Greitzer
[8] consists of grooves or perforations over the tips of the rotors in an axial flow
compressor (Fig. 5). This treatment has shown a marked improvement to the stall
margin as it results in considerable reduction in passage blockage when the stall is
approached. The effectiveness of this treatment extends over compressor operations
between relative mach numbers of roughly 0.15 and 1.5. However, the usefulness of
the casing treatment is limited to wall stall rotors and it is least effective in cases of
stall occurring at blades or hub.

18. The active systems use controller that sense the approaching stall and take
remedial action (such as blow-off valves or rapid rescheduling of the stator vanes) to
prevent the disturbance from developing. Such controls are achieved by simply
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7th National Aeronautical Conference, 26th ~ 27th March, 1995 : PAF Academy, Risalpur – Pakistan

unloading the compressor, hence are called as avoidance controls, instead of active
controls, because they don’t interfere with the unsteady aerodynamic damping in the
compressor.

19. Active Suppression of Rotating Stall. Day [3], most recently,

developed a system of active suppression, employing two approaches. The first
approach is based on suppression of modal wave (when such a wave exists), whereas
the second introduces a new technique of flow energizing applied directly to the
emerging stall cell. He developed an air injection system by building an array of
individually controlled valves, equally spaced from each other. These valves were
installed near the tips of first rotor as this is the location where the stall cells were
known to appear first (Fig. 6).

20. In this experiment, the modal disturbances of long length were detected and
suppressed by using feed back of controlled disturbances and 4.0% mass flow rate
improvement in stall margin were achieved. Short length scale stall cells, emerging
without precursive build-up and being of localized extent, were removed by
employing repeated air injection locally and stall margin improvement of 5 to 6%
were attained (Fig. 7). The results show the suppression of stalling disturbances
using fast acting air injection technique is both practical and effective in the two stall
onset processes.

21. Active Control of Rotating Stall. Traditionally, the solution to the

problems of compressor flow field instabilities has been to improve the aerodynamic
design of the compressor to extend the operating range which includes the balanced
stage loading and casing treatment. Whereas, the active control techniques have
been developed that are based on moving the operating point close to the surge line
when surge does not threaten, and then quickly increasing mass flow when required,
either in closed or open-loop manner.

22. The open loop techniques are based on the fact that compressor stability is
strongly influenced by inlet distortion which can arise from inlet separation,
armament firing, aircraft manoeuvres, takeoff in cross winds etc. Hence the aircraft
flight control and engine fuel control are coupled to continually adjust the engine
operating point so as to yield the minimum stall margin required at each
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7th National Aeronautical Conference, 26th ~ 27th March, 1995 : PAF Academy, Risalpur – Pakistan

instantaneous flight condition. For the closed loop stall avoidance, sensors are used
in the compressor to determine the onset of stall by measuring the level of
unsteadiness. On detection of onset of stall, control system moves the operating
point to higher mass flow away from the stall line.

23. Recently, Paudano et. al. [4] have come up with a new technique to solve the
problem posed by rotating stall. This technique increases the stable flow range by
using a closed-loop control to damp the unsteady perturbations that lead to the
rotating stall. After sensing the wave of the axial velocity propagating in the
upstream direction, the additional circumferentially traveling waves are generated
with appropriate phase and amplitude by ‘wiggling’ inlet guide vanes driven by
individual actuators (Fig. 8). This technique, which uses the concept of dynamic
stabilization, has the advantage that engine power always remain high contrary to the
application of stall avoidance control which requires a power cut back (often at
critical flight conditions). The control scheme considers the wave pattern in terms of
individual spatial Fourier components and a simple proportional control is
implemented for each harmonic. The improvement in operating range is potentially
greater ranging from 11 to 23% depending upon the mode of control (Fig. 9).

CONCLUSION
24. The research in the field of rotating stall has been continued for many
decades. The investigators have developed various theories about different aspects of
the phenomenon, and many of them have been verified experimentally. But most of
the work under taken has been confined either to the two-dimensional and low-speed
flow through the axial compressors, or to the single stage machines. Moreover,
many conclusions drawn from the experimental work could have not been
generalized for both single stage and multistage compressors and no significant work
has been taken up for high speed machines. Stall propagation is undoubtedly a
phenomenon of a grate importance to the engine aerodynamics. Although much has
been achieved but the understanding is not complete and a great deal of work is
needed to be done to obtain the control of this instability.

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7th National Aeronautical Conference, 26th ~ 27th March, 1995 : PAF Academy, Risalpur – Pakistan

REFERENCES

[1]. Emmons, H. W., Person, C.F., and Grant, H.P., “Compressor Surge and Stall Propagation,”
Transactions of the ASME, Vol. 79, 1955, pp. 455-469.

[2]. Day, I. J., “Active Suppression of Rotating Stall and Surge in Axial Compressors,” ASME
Journal of Turbomachinery, Vol. 115, January 1993, pp. 1-9.

[3]. Day, I. J., “Active Suppression of Rotating Stall and Surge in Axial Compressors,” ASME
Journal of Turbomachinery, Vol. 115, Jan 1993, pp.40-47.

[4]. Paduano, J. D., Epstein, A. H., Valavani, L., Longley, J. P., Greitzer, E.M., and Guentte, G.
R., “Active Contrrol of Rotating Stall in a Low-speed Axial Compressors,” ASME Journal of
Turbomachinery, Vol. 115, Jan 1993, pp.48-56.

[5]. Breugelmans, F. A. E., Mathiodakis, K., and Casalini, F., “Rotating Stall Cell in a Low-
speed Axial Flow Compressor,” Journal of Aircraft, Vol. 22, No. 3, March 1985, pp.175-181.

[6]. Mathiodaksis, K., and Breugelmans, F. A. E., “Three-Dimensional Deep Rotating Stall Cell
of an Axial Compressor,” Journal of Propulsion, Vol. 4, No. 3, May-June 1988, pp. 263-269.

[7]. Day, I. J., and Cumpsty, N. A., “The Measurement and Interpretation of Flow within
Rotating Stall Cells in Axial Compressors,” Journal Mechanical Engineering Science,” Vol. 20,
No. 2, 1978, pp. 101-114.

[8]. Greitzer, E. M., “Review-Axial Compressor Stall Phenomena,” ASME Journal of

Turbomachinery, Vol. 102, June 1980, pp.134-150.

[9]. Abed, E. H., Houpt, P. K., and Hosny, W. M., “Bifurcation Analysis of Surge and Rotating
Stall in Axial Flow Compressors,” ASME Journal of Turbomachinery, Vol. 115, October 1993,
pp. 817-824.

[10]. Greitzer, E. M., and Moore, F. K., “A Theory of Post Stall Transients in Axial
Compression Systems: Part-I and Part-II,” ASME Journal of Engineering for Gas Turbine and
Power, Vol. 108, April 1986, pp. 68-76 and pp. 231-239.

[11]. Gostelow, J. P., Cascade Aerodynamics, Pergamon Press, Newyork, 1984, pp. 61-181.

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7th National Aeronautical Conference, 26th ~ 27th March, 1995 : PAF Academy, Risalpur – Pakistan

Fig. 1 (a) Potential flow over an airfoil (b) Stalled flow above an airfoil

Fig. 2 Schematic representation of rotating stall Fig. 3 Compressor performance map

Fig. 4 Perturbation mode of Order 1 Fig. 5 Axial groove casing treatment

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7th National Aeronautical Conference, 26th ~ 27th March, 1995 : PAF Academy, Risalpur – Pakistan

Fig. 6 Schematic picture of trapdoor-type Fig. 7 Compressor Characteristics with

air injection valves active stall suppression

Fig. 8 Conceptual control scheme using Fig. 9 Compressor characteristics with

“wiggly” inlet guide vanes active control

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