1. Compressor Cascade Pressure Rise Prediction
ME 491 Project
Department of Mechanical Engineering, IUPUI
Julia Zafian-Short
December 2004

2. Outline Goals and Approach Computational Setup Results
Summary and Conclusions

3. Goals and Approach To model flow around a NASA/GE E3 rotor blade.
Apply 2-D CFD using Star-design.
Quantitative post processing using starviz.

4. Computational Setup Domain and boundary conditions Mesh
Parameters
Cell type and sizes (near wall and far field)
Solution parameters
Method
Convergence criteria

5. Domain, Boundary Conditions and Mesh
Inlet, velocity
60 m/s
Periodic
30 m/s
Periodic
Pressure
Symmetry
No change Normal to Surface

6. Mesh Tetrahedral Cells 7 layers Surface size 0.1
Subsurface Thickness 0.5
Prismatic Cells

7. Method Incompressible flow assumptions Upwind differencing
High Reynolds number K-epsilon
Convergence on 0.001Mass Flow Residual

8. Results
Velocity
Pressure
Pressure rise characteristic
Flow features

9. Tangential Velocity, Vy -70 to –20 m/s, increment of 5 m/s

10. Axial Velocity, Vz 15 to 45 m/s, increment of 3 m/s

11. Pressure 97,900 to 100,400 Pa, increment 250Pa

12. Stagnation Pressure 100,400-101,600 Pa, increment 120 Pa
Wake

13. Stagnation Pressure Coefficient -0.4 to 0, increment of 0.04
Cp=(P-Pref)/(0.5rVref2)
Dimensionless Stagnation Pressure
(using reference values from the inlet)

14. Similar Calculations for a Range of Inlet Axial Velocities.

15. Streamline Comparison for Different Inlet Velocities
Inlet Velocity
Inlet Velocity
60 m/s
60 m/s
16 m/s
30 m/s
Separation
Bubble

16. Summary and Conclusions
The operating limit for the incoming axial velocity is found to be 20 m/s for maximum pressure gradient.
As the mass flow drops further, the angle between the flow and the leading edge of the blade increases, increasing the wake.