Grid generation methodology

and CFD simulations in sliding vane

compressors and expanders
Giuseppe Bianchi1,2, Sham Rane2, Ahmed Kovacevic2, Roberto Cipollone3, Stefano Murgia4, Giulio Contaldi4

London, 12/09/2017
Need of advanced design tools in vane machines

Performance improvement

 Leakages (gaps in the order of tens of µm)

 Friction power

 Optimal compression/expansion ratio

 Compression/expansion phase [Montenegro et al., 2014]

Challenges

 Moving and deforming grids

 Multiphase simulations required

[Zhang and Xu, 2014]

 Scarce know-how availability
[Kolasiński and Błasiak, 2015]

G. Bianchi Grid generation methodology and CFD simulations in sliding vane compressors and expanders 2
 Outline

✓ Motivations

 Deforming grid generation procedure

 Simulation setups

 Results

• Oil injected air compressor

• ORC expander

 Lessons learned

 Next challenges

G. Bianchi Grid generation methodology and CFD simulations in sliding vane compressors and expanders 3
 Numerical CFD simulations
in positive displacement machines

Deforming grid generation

CFD simulation setup

Available solvers:
Results
• ANSYS CFX
post-processing
• ANSYS FLUENT
• STAR-CCM +
• PumpLinx

Ports mesh
CAD model OpenFOAM under development
generation

G. Bianchi Grid generation methodology and CFD simulations in sliding vane compressors and expanders 4
 Grid generation procedure

• Fully parametric

• Easy to use and standalone

• Functional with most of the CFD solvers

G. Bianchi Grid generation methodology and CFD simulations in sliding vane compressors and expanders 5
 Mesh generation

Oil injected Air Compressor ORC Expander

Rotor Diameter 195 mm 65 mm
Axial Length 540 mm 60 mm
Tip Clearance 50 µm 10 µm
Ports Core Ports Core
Cell type Tetrahedral hexahedral Tetrahedral hexahedral
Node count (Million) 0.353 0.4735 0.135 0.157
Maximum aspect ratio 221 138 23 228
Minimum orthogonality 8.6 14.9 10.0 11.6

G. Bianchi Grid generation methodology and CFD simulations in sliding vane compressors and expanders 6
 Simulation setup in ANSYS® CFX
Air Compressor ORC Expander
Mesh deformation User defined nodal displacement via junction box routines in FORTRAN
Tetrahedral with boundary layer refinements
Mesh in ports
(Generated by ANSYS pre-processor)
Turbulence model SST – k Omega (Standard Wall Functions)
Inlet boundary condition Opening (Specified total pressure and temperature)
Opening (Static pressure
Outlet boundary condition
In case of backflow used as total pressure and temperature)
Control volume gradients Gauss divergence theorem
Advection scheme Upwind
Pressure-Velocity coupling Co-located layout (Rhie and Chow 4th order)
Transient scheme Second order (Fully implicit Backward Euler)
Transient inner loop
Up to 20 iterations per time step
coefficients
Convergence criteria r.m.s residual level 1e-03
Working fluid Air Ideal Gas + Liquid oil R236fa (NIST coefficients ARK table)
Relaxation parameters Solver relaxation fluids (0.1) Solver relaxation fluids (0.4)

• 0.5° crank angle step

• Boundary conditions:
Inlet Outlet Inlet Outlet
Pressure [bara] 1.01 8.7 12.1 4.6

Temperature [°C] 25.4 88.7 90.5 69.4

Revolution speed [RPM] 980 1551

• Oil injection at 65°C, 6.6 bara

G. Bianchi Grid generation methodology and CFD simulations in sliding vane compressors and expanders 7
 Compressor results

G. Bianchi Grid generation methodology and CFD simulations in sliding vane compressors and expanders 8
 Compressor results

G. Bianchi Grid generation methodology and CFD simulations in sliding vane compressors and expanders 9
 Expander results

G. Bianchi Grid generation methodology and CFD simulations in sliding vane compressors and expanders 10
 Expander results

G. Bianchi Grid generation methodology and CFD simulations in sliding vane compressors and expanders 11
 Experimental validation (ongoing)
13.0

Multiple energy recovery regimes 12.0

Absolute pressure [bara]

11.0
10.0
9.0
• Pressure ratios (pmax)
8.0
7.0
6.0
• Temperatures 5.0
4.0
3.0
0 100 200 300
8.5 Crank angle

7.5

6.5

7.0 5.5

6.5 4.5
6.0
3.5
5.5
5.0 2.5
0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350
4.5
4.0
3.5
3.0
2.5
2.0
0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350

G. Bianchi Grid generation methodology and CFD simulations in sliding vane compressors and expanders 12
 Conclusions
 Development of a customized grid generation methodology for vane machines
• Fully parametric

• Easy to use and standalone

• Functional with most of the CFD solvers

• Approximation of blade tip clearance to get an ‘O’ grid

 Multi-phase simulations on an oil-injected air compressor

• Tip clearance value is constrained by overall machine dimensions and grid size

• Sealing and cooling effects of lubricant injection

• Validation not yet achievable

 Single phase real gas simulations on a small-scale ORC expander

• Stable and faster simulation (pressure gradient concordant to rotation sense)

• Real gas modelling required

• Validation with indicating pressure data on multiple operating conditions

G. Bianchi Grid generation methodology and CFD simulations in sliding vane compressors and expanders 13
 Next challenges

 Grid sensitivity study

 Use of the numerical simulation to optimize the machine performance

 Multi-phase simulations

 Fluid-structure simulations to account for friction

G. Bianchi Grid generation methodology and CFD simulations in sliding vane compressors and expanders 14
 Acknowledgements

www.foodenergy.org.uk

Grant No. EP/K011820/1 Follow us on

G. Bianchi Grid generation methodology and CFD simulations in sliding vane compressors and expanders 15
 Grid generation methodology
and CFD simulations in sliding vane
compressors and expanders
Giuseppe Bianchi1,2, Sham Rane2, Ahmed Kovacevic2, Roberto Cipollone3, Stefano Murgia4, Giulio Contaldi4

London, 12/09/2017