Application of the Ball-Spine Algorithm to Design Axial-Flow Compressor Blade

Document Type : Research Note

Authors

1 Department of Mechanical Engineering, Amirkabir University of Technology (Tehran Polytechnic) Tehran, Iran

2 Department of Mechanical Engineering, Isfahan University of Technology, Isfahan, Iran

Abstract

In this paper, a novel inverse design algorithm called as Ball Spine algorithm is developed to design the blade to blade flow passage of axial-flow compressors. The algorithm considers the blade surfaces as a set of virtual balls that move freely along the specified directions, called ‘spines’. To start the solution an initial guess for the blade geometry is required. Then the blade-to-blade flow field is solved using an in-house inviscid solver. Comparing the computed pressure distribution (CPD) with the target pressure distribution (TPD) over the blade surfaces, gives guidelines in differential movements for the balls to obtain a modified geometry. For the modified geometry, new grids are automatically generated by an algebraic-elliptic grid-generator. The sequence is repeated until the target pressure is met. An error parameter, ∆PD, indicating the difference between CPD and TPD along the suction and pressure surfaces is computed while the blade geometry evolves toward the target geometry. For the initial guess, ∆PD is obtained as 13700 Pa, while after 100 generations, ∆PD is reduced to 222 Pa.

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Scientia Iranica
Volume 21, Issue 6 - Serial Number 6
Transactions on Mechanical Engineering (B)
December 2014
Pages 1981-1992

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