Large Eddy Simulation of Externally Induced Ingress about an Axial Seal by Stator Vanes

Sabina Nketia, Kenneth Mark Bryden, Richard Dalton and Tom I-P. Shih ()
Additional contact information
Sabina Nketia: School of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN 47907, USA
Kenneth Mark Bryden: Ames National Laboratory, United States Department of Energy, Ames, IA 50011, USA
Richard Dalton: National Energy Technology Laboratory, United States Department of Energy, Morgantown, WV 26505, USA
Tom I-P. Shih: School of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN 47907, USA

Energies, 2023, vol. 16, issue 16, 1-17

Abstract: Turbine inlet temperatures in advanced gas turbines could be as high as 2000 °C. To prevent ingress of this hot gas into the wheelspace between the stator and rotor disks, whose metals can only handle temperatures up to 850 °C, rim seals and sealing flows are used. This study examines the abilities of large eddy simulation (LES) based on the WALE subgrid model and Reynolds-averaged Navier–Stokes (RANS) based on the SST model in predicting ingress in a rotor–stator configuration with vanes but no blades, a configuration with experimental data for validation. Results were obtained for an operating condition, where the ratio of the external Reynolds number to the rotational Reynolds number is 0.538. At this operating condition, both LES and RANS were found to correctly predict the coefficient of pressure, C p , located downstream of the vanes and upstream of the seal, but only LES was able to correctly predict the sealing effectiveness. This shows C p by itself is inadequate in quantifying externally induced ingress. RANS was unable to predict the sealing effectiveness because it significantly under predicted the pressure drop in the hot gas path along the axial direction, especially about the seal region. This affected the pressure difference across the seal in the radial direction, which ultimately drives ingress.

Keywords: rim seals; externally induced ingress; gas turbines (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/16/16/5985/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/16/16/5985/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jeners:v:16:y:2023:i:16:p:5985-:d:1217620

Access Statistics for this article

Energies is currently edited by Ms. Agatha Cao

More articles in Energies from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().