Development and Application of a Fast-Response Total Temperature Probe for Turbomachinery

Abstract

The measurement of unsteady total temperature is of great interest for the examination of loss mechanisms in turbomachinery with respect to the improvement of the efficiency. Since conventional thermocouples are limited in frequency response, several fast-response total temperature probes have been developed over the past years. To improve the spatial resolution compared to these existing probes and maintaining a high temporal resolution, a new fast-response total temperature probe has been developed at the Institute of Aircraft Propulsion Systems (ILA), Stuttgart, Germany in cooperation with Berns Engineers, Gilching, Germany. The design of the probe allows a sensitive measuring surface below 1 mm2. A detailed insight into the design of the probe, the measurement principle, the calibration process, and an estimation of the measurement uncertainty is given in the present paper. Furthermore, to prove the functionality of the probe, first experimental results of a simple test bed and of area traverses downstream of the first rotor of a two-stage low pressure turbine are presented. It is shown, that the new probe is capable of detecting rotor characteristic effects as well as rotor-stator-interactions. In addition, a hot-spot is investigated downstream of the first rotor of the turbine, and the findings are compared to the effects known from the literature.