Multicondition Optimization and Experimental Measurements of a Double Blade Centrifugal Pump Impeller

Abstract

In order to improve internal unsteady flow in a doubleblade centrifugal pump (DBCP), this study used major geometric parameters of the original design as the initial values, heads at three conditions (i.e., 80% design flow rate, 100% design flow rate, and 120% design flow rate) as the constraints conditions, and the maximum of weighted average efficiency at the three conditions as the objective function. An adaptive simulated annealing algorithm was selected to solve the energy performance calculation model and the supertransitive approximation method was applied to fix optimal weight factors of individual objectives. On the basis of hydraulic performance optimization, threecondition automatic computational fluid dynamics (CFD) optimization of impeller meridional plane for the DBCP was realized by means of Isight software integrated Pro/E, Gambit, and Fluent software. The shroud arc radii R0 and R1, shroud angle T1, hub arc radius R2, and hub angle T2 on the meridional plane were selected as the design variables and the maximum of weighted average hydraulic efficiency at the three conditions was chosen as the objective function. Performance characteristic test and particle image velocimetry (PIV) measurements of internal flow in the DBCP were conducted. Performance characteristic test results show that the weighted average efficiency of the impeller after the threecondition optimization has increased by 1.46% than that of original design. PIV measurements results show that vortex or recirculation phenomena in the impeller are distinctly improved under the three conditions.