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TURBOMACHINERY

Turbine Aerodynamics and Heat Transfer

Objectives

The laboratory deals with the design, testing and imporvement of axial turbines for aviation and power generation plants.

VKI investigates the aero-thermal performance of high-speed turbomachinery components found in gas turbine engines for aircraft propulsion. The research projects principally cover technologies for the high-pressure and low-pressure turbine modules. A large spectrum of aerothermal aspects of axial turbines is considered, ranging from fundamental studies on emerging technologies to the investigation of fully featured turbine hardware at TRL levels of 4-5.

A combination of computational and experimental methods to study the complex flow physics of axial turbines is used. The main strength is the experimental testing of turbine hardware with an extensive capability to take measurements on a wide variety of facilities for tests at low-speed and high-speed in cascade rigs as well as in a large-scale rotating machine.

 

 

Subjects of Research

Turbine cooling and heat transfer,

Unsteady flows and blade row interactions,

Surface and roughness effects in ALM manufactured components,

Cavity and leakage flows,

Low-Reynolds high-speed turbine aerodynamics,

Aerothermal performance of shape-optimized gas path surfaces.

Topics

Diagnostic with state-of-art intrusive instrumentation and high-speed optical measurements

AI-based design/optimization and performance prediction tools

Turbine technologies for new engine cycles and green fuels

Off-design performance and flow control
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