Flow analysis of the hole diaphragm labyrinth seal by the CFD method

Abstract

The computational fluid dynamics (CFD) method is an efficient way to reduce the obstacles in fluid studies. Good use of the CFD method on the seal-rotor system area was proven again in this paper. The flow analyses of a new type of annular seal, the hole diaphragm labyrinth seal (HDLS), were studied by Fluent. Complex working conditions were considered to further understand the flow field variation trend. The results show that the maximum velocity component was obtained in the middle cavities perpendicular to the whirl direction. The velocity distributions before the first cavity and behind the last cavity show a different trend under a 50 Hz whirl frequency than that of other whirl frequencies, which can be described by the most apparent throttling effect of the first blade and the diffuse effect behind the last blade. It is helpful to further understand different annular seal characteristics by detailed fluid information analyses.