Numerical Predictions of Three-Dimensional Unsteady Turbulent Film-Cooling for Trailing Edge of Gas-Turbine Blade Using Large Eddy Simulation

Abstract

This work investigates the performance of film-cooling on trailing edge of gas turbine blades using unsteady three-dimensional numerical model adopting large eddy simulation (LES) turbulence scheme in a low Mach number flow regime. This study is concerned with the scaling parameters affecting effectiveness and heat transfer performance on the trailing edge, as a critical design parameter, of gas turbine blades. Simulations were performed using ANSYS-fluentworkbench 17.2. High quality mesh was adapted, whereas the size of cells adjacent to the wall was optimized carefully to sufficiently resolve the boundary layer to obtain insight predictions of the film-cooling effectiveness on a flat plate downstream the slot opening. Blowing ratio, density ratio, Reynolds number, and the turbulence intensity of the mainstream and coolant flow are optimally examined against the film-cooling effectiveness. The predicted results showed a great agreement when compared with the experiments. The results show a distinctive behavior of the cooling effectiveness with blowing ratio variation as it has a dip in vicinity of unity which is explained by the behavior of the vortex entrainment and momentum of coolant flow. The negative effect of the turbulence intensity on the cooling effectiveness is demonstrated as well.