FUTURE - Flutter Free Turbomachinery Blades
EU-funded project focusing on the experimental and numerical investigation of flutter in turbomachine components such as compressor and turbine rotors. The project involves 25 partners from industry, research institutes and academia throughout Europe as well as South Africa and is led by KTH.
Flutter denotes a self-excited and self-sustained vibration phenomenon of turbomachinery blades that can lead to failure unless properly damped. The present trends in turbomachinery design to increase component loading while reducing structural weight can lead to critical situations from a flutter point-of-view. Articles from literature report that although 90% of the potential High Cycle Fatigue (HCF) problems are covered during development testing, the remaining few problems account for nearly 30% of the total development cost and are responsible for over 25% of all engine distress events. Problems related to flutter therefore impose large cost and program delays since they are encountered late in development when engines are tested in full power or in flight conditions.
Today, fundamental blade design with respect to flutter is still based to a large degree on relatively simple empirical criteria. These rules are mostly over-conservative and therefore not applicable to modern highly loaded, lightweight components. On the other hand analysis techniques have evolved considerably and allow for detailed analysis of unsteady aerodynamic phenomena. The foremost reason for still having these simple criteria in use today is the lack of proper validation data addressing complex 3D flows involving non-linear viscous effects, and real engine multi-row environments.
FUTURE brings together European and overseas well-reputed centres-of-excellence in order to reach major scientific & technical objectives in striving towards flutter-free turbomachine blades. By advancing the state-of-the-art in flutter prediction capabilities and design rules, the FUTURE project will lead to benefits in terms of decreased development cost, reduced weight and fuel consumption, and increased ability to efficiently manage flutter problems occurring on engines in service.
Period
2008-07-01 - 2012-06-30
Project Partners
KTH – Kungliga Tekniska Högskolan
Volvo Aero
MTU Aero Engines GmbH
Avio Spa
Siemens Industrial Turbomachinery AB
Industria de Turbopropulsores S.A.
Rolls-Royce plc.
Snecma
Turbomeca
Alstom
Cerfacs
Techspace Aero
PCA Engineers Limited
Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt e.V.
Council for Scientific and Industrial Research
Centro de Tecnologías Aeronáuticas
Onera
École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne
Stellenbosch University
Universidad Politécnica de Madrid
Università degli studi di Firenze
Politecnico di Torino
École Centrale de Lyon
Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine
Project Lead
Prof Torsten Fransson, KTH
Dr Damian Vogt, KTH
Researchers
Alan Vargas
Dr Damian Vogt
Funding
EU FP7
Keywords
Aeroelasticity, Blade Vibration, CFD, Compressor, Flutter, Full-scale tests, HCF, Turbines, Turbomachines, Unsteady