Unsteady rans analysis of particles deposition in the coolant channel of a gas turbine blade using a non-linear model

The two-phase flow in a geometry representing the final portion of the internal cooling channels of a gas turbine blade is here presented and discussed. In the configuration under scrutiny, the coolant flows inside the duct in radial direction and it leaves the blade through the trailing edge after a 90 deg turning. An unsteady Reynolds Averaged Navier-Stokes (URANS) simulation of the flow inside such channel was carried out. An original non-linear version of the well-established ζ-f elliptic relaxation model was developed and applied here. The new model was implemented in the well-validated TFlowS code currently developed by the authors-f group at Sapienza Universita di Roma. The predictions demonstrated a good accuracy of the nonlinear URANS model, clearly improving the results of the baseline linear ζ-f model and of the Launder Sharma k-ε model used as reference. The obtained unsteady flow field was adopted to track a large number of solid particles released from several selected sections at the inlet and representing the powders usually dispersed (sand, volcanic ashes) in the air spilled from the compressor and used as cooling fluid. The well-validated particle-tracking algorithm here adopted for determining the trajectories demonstrated to be very sensitive to the flow unsteadiness. Finally, the fouling of the solid surfaces was estimated by adopting a model based on the coefficient of restitution approach. © 2014 by ASME.