Centrifugal Pump Performance Drop Due to Leading Edge Cavitation: Numerical Predictions Compared With Model Tests

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to present the results obtained with a 3-D numerical method allowing the prediction of the cavitation behavior of a centrifugal pump and to compare this prediction to model tests. The influence of the diffuser on the pump performances, for a cavitating flow, is taken into account by performing coupled computations. The proposed method, which allows the performance drop prediction, consists of assuming the cavity interface as a free surface boundary of the computation domain and in computing the single phase flow. The unknown shape of the interface is determined using an iterative procedure matching the cavity surface to a constant pressure boundary (pv ). The originality of the method is that the adaptation process is done apart from the flow calculation, allowing to use any available code.