Gas Turbine Rotor Blade Segmentation for Weight Reduction
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing gas turbine engine rotor blades and platforms are over-designed and costly due to integral construction, which leads to increased stress, weight, and manufacturing complexity, particularly in the platform area subjected to lower stress levels.
Innovation Solution
The rotor assembly features separate dovetail slots and diskposts for rotor blades and platform sections, allowing for the use of different materials and designs for each component, reducing stress and manufacturing costs by enabling thinner, lighter blades and platforms, and facilitating field replacement and enhanced cooling schemes.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Strength
If integral blade construction is used, then structural strength is improved, but weight and manufacturing cost increase
Solution Approach 1:
The blade is divided into multiple segments including blade portions and platform portions that can be manufactured separately and then assembled together. This segmentation allows each portion to be optimized independently for weight and strength requirements, eliminating the need to over-design the entire integral structure.
Solution Approach 2:
Different portions of the blade are manufactured from materials with different properties tailored to local stress conditions. The blade portions experience higher stresses and use stronger materials, while platform portions experience lower stresses and use lighter materials, optimizing the overall weight-strength balance.
2Stability of the object's composition
If integral blade construction is used, then structural integrity is improved, but manufacturing complexity and cost increase
Solution Approach 1:
The blade is divided into multiple segments including blade portions and platform portions that can be manufactured separately using simpler processes and then assembled together. This segmentation allows each portion to be manufactured independently with reduced complexity while maintaining overall structural integrity through the assembly connection.
3Temperature
If complex geometries with cooling passages are included, then thermal management is improved, but manufacturing difficulty and time increase
Solution Approach 1:
The blade is divided into multiple segments including blade portions and platform portions, allowing cooling passages to be incorporated into specific segments that require them. This segmentation enables thermal management features to be added only where necessary without complicating the manufacturing of the entire blade structure.
Solution Approach 2:
Cooling passages and other complex features are incorporated locally into specific blade portions that require thermal management, while platform portions maintain simpler geometries. This local quality approach enables thermal management without unnecessarily increasing overall manufacturing difficulty.
Data Source
AI summary
A rotor assembly includes a rotor disc including a plurality of circumferentially-spaced diskposts and a plurality of dovetail slots. Each dovetail slot is defined between a pair of circumferentially-adjacent diskposts. A plurality of rotor blades are coupled to the rotor disc. Each rotor blade includes a dovetail portion that is configured to slidably engage a respective dovetail slot. A plurality of platform sections are coupled to the rotor disc such that each platform section is adjacent a respective rotor blade. Each platform section includes a diskpost slot that is configured to receive one of the plurality of diskposts such that each dovetail slot receives a respective dovetail portion and at least a portion of at least one of the platform sections adjacent the rotor blade.