Centrifugal compressor flow instabilities at lowmass flow rate

Abstract: Turbochargers play an important role in increasing the energetic efficiency andreducing emissions of modern power-train systems based on downsized recipro-cating internal combustion engines (ICE). The centrifugal compressor in tur-bochargers is limited at off-design operating conditions by the inception of flowinstabilities causing rotating stall and surge. They occur at reduced enginespeeds (low mass flow rates), i.e. typical operating conditions for a betterengine fuel economy, harming ICEs efficiency. Moreover, unwanted unsteadypressure loads within the compressor are induced; thereby lowering the com-pressors operating life-time. Amplified noise and vibration are also generated,resulting in a notable discomfort.The thesis aims for a physics-based understanding of flow instabilities andthe surge inception phenomena using numerical methods. Such knowledge maypermit developing viable surge control technologies that will allow turbocharg-ers to operate safer and more silent over a broader operating range. Therefore,broadband turbulent enabled compressible Large Eddy Simulation (LES) cal-culations have been performed and several flow-driven instabilities have beencaptured under unstable conditions. LES produces large amounts of 3D datawhich has been post-processed using Fourier spectra and Dynamic Mode De-composition (DMD). These techniques are able to quantify modes in the flowfield by extracting large coherent flow structures and characterize their relativecontribution to the total fluctuation energy at associated. Among the mainfindings, a dominant mode was found which describes the filling and emptyingprocess during surge. A narrowband feature at half of the rotating order wasidentified to correspond to co-rotating vortices upstream of the impeller faceas well as elevated velocity magnitude regions propagating tangentially in thediffuser and the volute. Dominant mode shapes were also found at the rotatingorder frequency and its harmonics, which manifest as a spinning mode shapelocalized at the diffuser inlet.From the compressible LES flow solution one can extract the acoustic infor-mation and the noise affiliated with the compressor. This enable through datacorrelation quantifying the flow-acoustics coupling phenomena in the compres-sor. Detailed comparison of flow (pressure, velocity) and aeroacoustics (soundpressure levels) predictions in terms of time-averaged, fluctuating quantities,and spectra is carried out against experimental measurements.