Turbulence Measurements and Analysis in a Multistage Axial Turbine

Abstract

This paper presents turbulence measurements and detailed flow analysis in an axial turbine stage. Fast response aerodynamic probes were used to resolve aperiodic fluctuations along the three directions. Assuming incompressible flow, the effective turbulence level and Reynolds stress are retrieved by evaluating the stochastic velocity component out of the measured time-resolved pressure and flow angle fluctuations along the streamwise, radial, and circumferential direction. A comparison between turbulence intensity and measured total pressure shows that flow structures with higher turbulence level are identified in the region of loss cores at the exit of the second stator passage. Turbulence intensity is evaluated under isotropic and nonisotropic assumption in order to quantify the departure from isotropic conditions. The measurements show that locally the streamwise fluctuating component can be twice bigger than the radial and tangential component. The current analysis shows that multisensor fast response aerodynamic probes can be used to provide information about the mean turbulence levels in the flow and the Reynolds stress tensor, in addition to the measurements of unsteady total pressure loss.