Optimizing the Performance of Swirl Recovery Vane on Fokker 29 Propeller Using Design of Experiments Method

Abstract

The swirl recovery vane (SRV) oriented in the slipstream of the propeller can in principle recover the swirl effect and thus would improve the propulsion performance in terms of thrust production and propulsive efficiency. The present study employs the design of experiments (DoEs) method to optimize the geometry of the specific SRV for Fokker 29 propeller for the sake of further enhancing the thrust generation and swirling recovery. First, orthogonal experiment was employed to identify the most significant factors, which directly influence the thrust production. Second, steepest ascent method was used to search the optimum range of target factors through climbing and factorial experiments. The resulting optimal solution was evaluated by the center composite experiment. Results show that the thrust generated by the SRV has been increased significantly (11.78%) after optimization at the design point, and a 0.66% increment in the total efficiency of the propeller–SRV system has been obtained. For the off-design point, an increment of the total efficiency (2.10%) can be observed at low rotating speed. Additionally, the optimized SRV is able to correct the out-flow behavior at the tip region of the vane, where the tip vortex and swirl kinetic energy loss is weaken, and the thrust distribution along the spanwise direction tends to be more uniform.