Counter-rotating turbomachines have been widely studied as a promising way to enhance performances and handle off-design instabilities through rotational velocities modulation. Although many published research works can be found concerning axial counter-rotating turbomachines, there is only a very few works about centrifugal ones. In this paper, a preliminary design and performance analysis under certain constraints is made to check the applicability of counter-rotating impellers on centrifugal compressors. The design approach is based on 0D/1D  models, velocity triangles and coupled with genetic optimization method in order to fulfill the design criteria. A comparison of the aerodynamic performances of this new configuration with a baseline standard configuration already built and tested in the laboratory, is made.

The counter-rotating stage consists of two successive centrifugal or mixed-flow impellers. These two impellers are separated by a typically narrow gap. The rear impeller is designed parametrically while taking into account the flow conditions at the outlet of the front-impeller.

During the optimization process, the performance of selected impellers is determined using a set of 0D/1D loss models validated by some available experimental data.

In conclusion, a selection of candidate solutions is analyzed using 3D CFD solver to choose the most exact configuration for manufacturing and experimentally testing.


Preliminary Study of a Centrifugal Compressor With Counter-Rotating Impellers: Design and Performances Study

Division / Sponsor:
International Gas Turbine Institute (IGTI)

Paper Proceedings: https://asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/GT/GT2020/volume/84058

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