CFD Analysis of a 15-Stage Axial Compressor

ANSYS CFX software has been used to perform a full 3-D flow analysis of 15-stage axial
compressor in one computation. Because these simulations included tip gaps, mass bleeds, hub
leakage flows, and ranged from single passage to full 360 degree analysis, this was an extremely
challenging project. Within the CFD simulations, various effects were analyzed: mesh style and
refinement, boundary conditions, steady or transient, tip clearance and numerical issues
including turbulence model choice and advection model choice. The total number of nodes used
for the entire simultaneous analysis of the inlet guide vane (IGV) and 15 stages (31 components,
single passage) was approximately 6.2 million nodes. For the 360 degree simulation, a mesh with
a total of 32 million nodes was used to compute the entire middle section of the compressor (5
stages).

Overview of the mesh for the 15 stage, single passage analysis

Mesh (32 million nodes) for the 360 degree analysis of the middle portion of the compressor (5
stages)

Convergence history for a typical simulation with a 2nd order advection scheme on the fine
mesh, from the initial guess to convergence. Tight steady-state convergence is obtained in less
than 120 iterations.

Mass flow rates are usually required for high power output of the gas turbine. The high mass
flow rate is critically dependent on the first compressor stage where choking can occur. The mass
flow rate is ultimately limited by the mechanical stresses, operating range and the stage
efficiency. The figure below illustrates the normalized relative Mach number evolution near the
tip region for the first stage rotor. The local peak Mach number is on the suction side of the rotor.
Under these particular operating conditions, choke occurs at about 82% of the chord at the
suction side and 15% of the chord at the pressure side.

Relative Mach number

The chart below shows the dimensionless static pressure evolution versus axial distance. The
axial position 0 corresponds to the inlet of the guide vane while position 1 is the outlet of the
15th stator. “Pref” corresponds to the static pressure at the last casing measurement point. The
CFD data points are obtained at all nodes along the periodic/shroud line of intersection. The
experimental data was obtained from a series of casing pressure taps, located ahead and behind
of each stator blade. The agreement between the static pressure measurements and numerical
results is extremely good, even for the coarse mesh. Small differences are seen between the
coarse mesh and the fine mesh. An expected disturbance in the predicted static pressure is seen at
each mass bleed location on the casing (mb1 to mb5). The largest mass bleed occurs near the
trailing edge of stator 13 (axial position of approximately 0.92), corresponding to the largest
casing static pressure disturbance. The agreement between the static pressure measurements and
numerical results is satisfactory. CFD predictions are obtained from simulations on the coarse
mesh, and on the fine mesh with and without leakage flows. The agreement to data is similar for
all three simulations. The result from the simulation including leakage flow is slightly closer to
the data. The main effect of the stator leakage flows is to disturb the boundary layer upstream of
the stator passage, as well as cause a slight shift in the meridional mass distribution as the stator
passage accommodates the increased local passage mass flow.

Comparison between predicted and experimental static pressure on the shroud

The chart below illustrates the dimensionless total pressure developments, along the span, for
three different axial positions located in front of stator 5, stator 7, and stator 14. In these figures,
Pref corresponds to the total pressure at the exit of the compressor respectively. The comparison
between the predicted results and measurements shows a good agreement in both radial gradients
and absolute values. The leakage flow introduces additional losses mainly due to a reverse flow
near the hub region. Thus, modeling the leakage flows better predicts the flow near the end wall
regions.

Local profile developments of the total pressure

References
[1] T. Belamri, P. Galpin, A. Braune and C. Cornelius, “CFD Analysis of 15 stage axial
compressor Part I: Methods”, GT2005-68261, ASME Turbo Expo Conference, Reno June 6-9,
2005.
[2] T. Belamri, P. Galpin, A. Braune and C. Cornelius, “CFD Analysis of 15 stage axial
compressor Part II: Results”, GT2005-68262, ASME Turbo Expo Conference, Reno June 6-9,
2005.