Cavitation Erosion Resistance Assessment and Comparison of Three Francis Turbine Runner Materials

Abstract

Cavitation erosion is the most important erosion mechanism in Francis turbine runner blades. For this reason, knowledge of a material's ability to resist cavitation is important in defining how suitable it is for use in a Francis turbine. In this study, three Francis turbine materials were subjected to cavitation erosion in a high-speed cavitation tunnel. One of the materials was a low-alloy steel, and the other two were stainless steels. The cavitation tunnel produced an annular cavitation field on one face of a cylindrical specimen. The test specimens underwent cavitation erosion until the erosion had reached a maximum penetration depth of about 0.5 mm. The material surface profiles were measured at regular intervals to calculate volume and mass loss. These losses were compared to those of several other materials that had undergone the same tests with the same setup and operational parameters. The materials were compared according to their steadystate erosion rates. The steady-state erosion rate represents a material's ability to resist cavitation erosion once cavitation damage has already started to develop. The low-alloy steel eroded four times faster than the two stainless steels. One of the stainless steels tested here (Stainless steel 1) had the lowest erosion rate, along with another previously tested stainless steel. The other stainless steel (Stainless steel 2) had a slightly greater erosion rate than the first, falling into the same class as other lower-grade stainless steels and a nickel aluminum bronze alloy. The results show that in choosing a turbine blade material, stainless steels outperform Manuscript

Shedding frequency in cavitation erosion evolution tracking

“…The material properties did not have any significance in the current approach, as the analysis concentrated on the shedding frequency analysis, which was assumed a flow related phenomenon. This study utilizes the material volume loss test results by Ylönen et al (2018), where the material properties were also thoroughly examined. Therefore, the volume loss curves used for comparison later in this study are the same ones already presented.…”

“…Both samples took about 65 hours to reach this state. Stainless steel 2 eroded more in volume and average erosion depth than stainless steel 1; therefore, it had an inferior resistance to cavitation, analyzed in more detail by Ylönen et al (2018).…”