SECONDARY AIR SYSTEMS IN AEROENGINES EMPLOYING VORTEX REDUCERS

摘要

A secondary air system in modern aero engines is required to cool the compressor and turbine discs and make sure that no hot gas ingestion occurs into the cavities between the turbine discs, which could cause an inadvertent reduction of disc life. A high integrity solution for guiding the air from the compressor to the turbine is through an inner bleed from the compressor platform and through the space between the disc bores and the shaft connecting the fan with the low pressure turbine. Since strongly swirling air is taken from the compressor platforms to a much lower radius, a means of deswirling the air has to be used to avoid excessive pressure losses along the flow path. The paper describes a system utilizing tubeless vortex reducers to accomplish this deswirl, which are compared to a more conventional air system utilizing tubes. The working principles of both types of vortex reducer and guidelines for the design of a secondary air system using vortex reducers are explained with supporting evidence from rig tests and CFD calculations. Opportunities for the aerodynamic optimisation of the tubeless vortex reducer are elaborated and the experience gained using the system during the development of the BR700 engine is described.