Date of Award

5-2001

Document Type

Thesis

Abstract

Modern gas turbines operate at high inlet temperatures due to which various components undergo severe thermal and mechanical stresses and fatigue. Suitable materials for withstanding such severe conditions are not available or are too expensive to manufacture. As a consequence, components need to be cooled to sustainable temperatures and efficient cooling strategies need to be developed. This study presents new internal cooling designs for turbine blades that eliminate the need for rib turbulators in internal passages producing significantly higher heat transfer enhancements. Detailed local heat transfer coefficient data of the proposed new designs (swirl generation using tangentially injected coolant from one pass to the second in serpentine coolant channels) are presented in this study. A transient liquid crystal technique involving a single color capturing method was employed in this study. Liquid crystals techniques are versatile and can be used for testing complex geometries. Also gas turbine internal coolant channels are typically tapered from hub to tip. Results are also presented for a tapered two-pass channel to compare and validate the assumption neglecting the effects of taper and using the local straight, two-pass channel data, for typically tapered internal coolant channels.

DOI

10.31390/gradschool_disstheses.8328

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