Experimental Contribution on the Significance and the Control by Transverse Injection of the Horseshoe Vortex

Abstract

The present study addresses two aspects of the horseshoe vortex, namely its significance in the secondary flow in a turbine blade passage and the possibility of reducing its strength by an active flow mechanism, i.e the transverse injection of coolant air through a slot in a cylinder-endwall junction. The study reports on the results of two experiments in low speed wind tunnels, which employed a calibrated five-hole Pitot tube to measure the velocity vectors and the resulting secondary flowfields. The first aspect was studied in a 90° square cross section bend duct. The two horseshoe vortex legs were simulated by two half-Delta wing vortex generators. The results showed that the horseshoe vortices influence two regions of the secondary flowfield, i.e one near the passage entrance, where the pressure side leg forces a three dimensional separation of the endwall boundary layer, and the other is in the exit plane, where the coupling of the horseshoe with the passage vortex redistributes the flow with total pressure losses, without affecting the total loss, and increases the secondary kinetic energy by about 20%. For the second aspect, a rectangular bluff body, with a cylindrical leading edge, was positioned over the tunnel endwall and the transverse air injection was implemented through a thin slot, covering the 180° arc in the leading edge-endwall junction. The results showed that, for an average injection velocity equal to 35% that of the mainstream, the size and strength of the horseshoe vortex leg were reduced by nearly 60%. On the other hand, for stronger injection rates the vortex size and strength were increased.