Turbine Rotor Blade Platform Cooling via Plenum Switchback
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional platform cooling designs for turbine rotor blades face challenges such as inadequate sealing, limited coolant control, high manufacturing costs, and inefficiency due to their complex geometry and assembly dependencies, leading to incomplete cooling and potential hot gas ingestion.
Innovation Solution
A platform cooling arrangement featuring a main plenum with an aft switchback and forward arc, along with strategically placed cooling apertures, that extends from the root to the airfoil, providing efficient heat exchange and coolant distribution, and can be cost-effectively manufactured using casting processes.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If conventional platform cooling designs are used, then cooling is provided to the platform region, but the design suffers from inadequate sealing, limited coolant control, high manufacturing costs, and inefficiency due to complex geometry and assembly dependencies
Solution Approach 1:
The cooling system is divided into multiple independent cooling circuits, each with its own plenum and aperture configuration. This segmentation allows each circuit to be optimized independently for specific regions of the platform, improving cooling effectiveness while simplifying the overall design by modularizing the complex geometry into manageable segments that can be manufactured separately and assembled systematically.
Solution Approach 2:
Different regions of the platform are provided with customized cooling circuits featuring varying aperture sizes, shapes, and distributions tailored to local thermal requirements. The plenums are strategically positioned and shaped to deliver coolant specifically to high-heat areas, optimizing cooling effectiveness while reducing unnecessary complexity in low-heat regions.
2Reliability
If conventional platform cooling designs are used, then cooling is provided to the platform region, but manufacturing costs are high due to complex geometry and assembly dependencies
Solution Approach 1:
Multiple cooling circuits are integrated into a unified platform structure with shared plenum chambers and coordinated aperture arrangements. This merging approach consolidates manufacturing operations, reduces the number of separate components requiring assembly, and simplifies production while maintaining the cooling effectiveness of multiple independent circuits through their integrated design.
3Reliability
If conventional platform cooling designs are used, then cooling is provided to the platform region, but coolant control is limited and coolant wastage occurs
Solution Approach 1:
The cooling system utilizes variable aperture configurations with different sizes, shapes, and orientations to optimize coolant flow parameters for specific thermal conditions. By adjusting aperture parameters locally across the platform surface, the system achieves precise coolant control that maximizes cooling effectiveness while minimizing wastage through optimized flow distribution and reduced turbulence.
4Reliability
If conventional platform cooling designs are used, then cooling is provided to the platform region, but sealing is inadequate leading to hot gas ingestion
Solution Approach 1:
Plenum chambers serve as intermediary structures that receive coolant from internal passages and distribute it through controlled aperture arrays. These plenums act as buffer zones that stabilize coolant flow before it exits through apertures, improving sealing effectiveness by reducing flow turbulence and pressure fluctuations that could compromise the seal between cooling circuits and the hot gas environment, thereby preventing hot gas ingestion.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
This design enhances cooling efficiency, reduces manufacturing complexity, and improves durability by ensuring comprehensive coolant coverage and flexibility, while minimizing coolant wastage and hot gas ingestion, thus extending the lifespan of turbine rotor blades.
Implementation Method 1
cool it with a flow of compressed air or other coolant during operation
Implementation Method 2
The coolant may circulate through the blade and exit through outlets
Data Source
AI summary
A platform cooling arrangement in a turbine rotor blade having a platform positioned between an airfoil and a root. The rotor blade, along a side that coincides with a pressure side of the airfoil, includes a pressure side of the platform includes a topside extending from an airfoil base to a pressure side slashface. The platform cooling arrangement includes: a main plenum residing just inboard of the topside in the pressure side of the platform, the main plenum extending through the platform from an upstream end having an aft position to a downstream end having a forward position; and cooling apertures. Near the upstream end, the main plenum includes an aft switchback, and, between the aft switchback and the downstream end, a forward arc. Each of the cooling apertures extends from the main plenum to a port formed on the pressure side slashface.