Power Technology and Engineering

Vol. 37, No. 1, 2003

A METHOD FOR ANALYSIS OF CAVITATION CHARACTERISTICS

A. V. Zakharov,1 A. A. Pomysov,2 A. S. Sabyshev,2 and G. I. Topazh1
Translated from Gidrotekhnicheskoe Stroitelstvo, No. 1, January 2003, pp. 27 29.

Cavitation is one of the major factors that produce a significant effect on the performance of a hydraulic machine. It is a well-known fact that an increase in cavitation ratio d = 1/H (B pv)/( Hs) (1 Hs)/H, where B is the barometric air pressure, pv is the vapor pressure, is the liquid density, H is the water head, and Hs is the suction head indicating the position of the hydraulic turbine wheel above the afterbay level, causes a pressure drop close to the turbine wheel, which may produce cavitation. At a critical value of d, cavitation produces an adverse effect on performance characteristics of the turbine wheel which, for example, may manifest itself in a reduced turbine efficiency. The cavitating ability of a hydraulic machine is assessed in terms of the critical cavitation ratio cr. The cr ratio is in fact a d ratio that characterizes cavitation conditions under which a 1% decrease in turbine efficiency () takes place. Determining cr is a laborious procedure, in which flow break-away characteristics (more conventionally, stall characteristics) are measured using special cavitation test benches. Using cavitation test results, a stall characteristic, that is, a = f(d) relationship, is plotted for each operating regime of a particular hydraulic machine; based on this characteristic, the value of cr for this regime is determined. In [1], a method for calculating cr has been proposed, in fact, based on the same principle plotting the = f(d) relationship. It was shown that, under cavitation conditions, any variation in efficiency is associated with the change in the torque Mz which, in turn, depends only on the way the load is distributed over the blade surface. Indeed, the efficiency of the hydraulic turbine is written as = (Mz)/QH, where Mz is the turbine wheel rotor torque, is the angular rotor speed, and Q is the flow rate. It is seen that under steady-state operating conditions ( = const, Q = const, H = const), the efficiency is a function of the torque only: M z = p rdS ,
s

(1)

where p is the pressure drop over a unit area dS of the blade surface and r is the dS unit area mid-point radius.
1 2

St. Petersburg State Technical University, St. Petersburg, Russia. nergomashkorporatsiya (Power-Plant Engineering Corporation) JointStock Co., Russia.

Thus, the cavitation-induced change in efficiency is a function of the pressure imposed on the wheel rotor blades. Suppose at a certain value (d)0 no cavitation occurs, and the corresponding efficiency and torque are h0 and Mz0. Suppose, as (d)1 < (d)0 (all other parameters being the same), cavitation sets in, with the resulting change in blade surface pressure, torque, and efficiency. Solving the problem of cavitation flow around the blade and thus determining the pressure field characteristic of this flow allows one to find Mz1 using formula (1) and to calculate the efficiency using the condition 1 = h* Mz1/Mz0. Given a range of ds, one can deter0 mine the corresponding efficiencies and, based on these data, one can plot a stall characteristic, that is, the relationship = f(d) for the given operating regime. As is known, cavitation sets in as the liquid pressure becomes equal to the vapor pressure, that is, a situation arises where the liquid becomes free of surface tension and, as a consequence, the liquid pressure cannot be less than the vapor pressure pv. One may assume therefore that over a portion of the blade in which the theoretical pressure (calculated within the framework of the cavitation-free flow of an ideal fluid around the blade) does not exceed pv, a cavitation cavity is created within which the pressure is constant and equal in value to pv. At present, no reliable methods for three-dimensional cavitation flow analysis of the blading of hydraulic machines are available. In [1], an approximate method for treating the issue in question has been proposed, based on the following. In a flow-around analysis of the blading, the common procedure is determining the profile of the dimensionless pressure coefficient p over the blade. It is assumed that the blade pressure becomes equal to the vapor pressure at local sites of the blade surface where the pressure coefficient p is equal in value and opposite in sign to the specified d. With reference to [1], it is further assumed that at blade sites where, by calculation, one has p d, one would rather prefer p = d; for the rest of the blade, the pressure is retained in accordance with the cavitation-free flow regime. It is assumed thereby that, under conditions with a cavitation cavity present, the cavitation-free portion of the pressure diagram, where p d, appears levelled-off, whereas the pressure field remains unaffected in the rest of the blade surface. With this in mind, one can plot a stall characteristic = f(d) and thus find the critical cavitation ratio cr for which the effi8
1570-145X/03/3701-0008$25.00 2003 Plenum Publishing Corporation

A Method for Analysis of Cavitation Characteristics

1.8 1.6 1 1.4 1.2 1.0 0.8 + 0.6 0.4 0.2 0.9 + 1.0 + 2 + 1.8 1.6 1.4 1.2 1

+
0.8 0.6 0.4 1.1

1.0

1.1

1.2

1.3

1.4

1.5

1.6

1.7

1.2

1.3

1.4

1.5

1.6

1.7

1.8

nI = (nI )opt

QI /(QI )opt

nI = 1.25(nI )opt

QI /(QI )opt

Fig. 1. Cavitation ratio plotted as a function of the flow rate for a PL15-type hydraulic turbine: +, experiment; 1, leading edge flow separation and draft-tube losses ignored; 2, leading edge flow separation and draft-tube losses accounted for.

ciency will decrease, for example, by 1%. To eliminate the error in efficiency due to the cavitation blade flow, it is convenient to consider the relative stall characterististic, that is, the relationship * = f(d), where * = 1/0 = Mz1/Mz0 is the scaled efficiency for the given d under specified operating conditions. In this case, the quantity d is determined subject to the condition * = 1/0 = Mz1/Mz0 = 0.99, where Mz1 and Mz0 are integrated torques for the cavitation-free and cavitation flow-around regimes (at a specified value of d), respectively. The method of interest was tested computationally using an automated program complex (Granit APC), intended for numerical analysis of integrated performance characteristics of hydraulic turbines and pumps. The experience gained in the employment of Granit APC has shown that in operating regimes of a hydraulic machine close to an optimum, the calculated and experimental cavitation ratios cr were in satisfactory agreement. However, in regimes remote from optimum, the stalling angle of attack (at which breakaway of the boundary layer from the blade lip takes place) tends to grow. In this case, the pressure profile over the blade surface (especially in a zone close to the blade lip, and in the rounded zone of the trailing edge of the blade) obtained within an ideal model of attached flow may differ appreciably from the actual pressure profile, even in the absence of cavitation. With this in mind, a cavitation flow analysis for a hydraulic machine was carried out in this work. Based on the familiar criteria of the boundary layer breakaway for blade cascades [3] and using an approximate method for separated flow-over analysis in [3], the pressure profile over the rotor blade surface is determined (with allowance made for the boundary layer breakaway). Next, the torque Mz0 for cavitation-free flow regime is calculated using formula (1) but with allowance for the boundary layer breakaway. Further, values of cr are calculated using the method discussed above. The

calculated results show that, with the stalled flow-over taken into account, cavitation characteristics of the wheel rotor can be determined with a significantly higher accuracy. In many actual situations, the effect of stalled flow-over on cavitation characteristics can be taken into account if, in the Mz0 and Mz1 torque analysis, small rounded zones (defined by the corresponding radii of curvature) at the leading and trailing blade edges are left out of consideration. Thus simplified, the procedure for determining cr will require much less effort. Another important condition, essential for the accurate determination of cr, that we consider in this work is energy loss in the draft tube. As is known, the draft-tube losses ht increase pressure imposed on the wheel rotor and thus improve its cavitation characteristics. Note that these losses do not affect the cavitation-free torque Mz0 for the reason that the incremental pressure on both sides of the blade is the same, which leaves the pressure drop over the blade unchanged. However, all else being the same, if cavitation comes into play, the losses ht produce alterations to the torque Mz1 and the relative efficiency *. In turn, this may affect substantially the calculated cavitation ratio cr. The local losses ht for different blade cascades were determined in this work as
2 ht = k1V u2 /2g + k2V m /2g,

where Vu and Vm are the average circumferential and meridional velocity projections on the trailing edge of the rotor blade; k1 and k2 are empirical loss coefficients, here taken equal to 0.8 and 0.25, respectively. Relevant data values of cr calculated by our method, by the method of [1], and experimental results are presented in Figs. 1 3. Three types of turbines of different rotor speed and with different cavitation characteristics were considered: a Kaplan horizontally positioned turbine (Fig. 1),

10
0.45 0.40 0.35 0.30 0.25 0.20 0.15 0.10 0.7 + + + ++ + 2 + 0.45

A. V. Zakharov et al.

+ 1 0.40 0.35 0.30 0.25 + 0.20 0.15 0.10 0.8 0.9 1.0 nI = (nI )opt 1.1 1.2 1.3 0.8 0.9 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 QI /(QI )opt nI = 1.07(nI )opt QI /(QI )opt + + 2 + + + 1

Fig. 2. Cavitation ratio plotted as a function of the flow rate for a PO45-type hydraulic turbine (for notations, see Fig. 1).
0.12 1 0.10 2 0.08 + 0.06 + 0.04 0.02 0.8 + 0.04 0.04 0.8 + 0.06 + + 0.08 + 0.10 2 + 0.12 1

0.9

1.0 1.1 nI = (nI )opt

1.2 1.3 QI /(QI )opt

0.9

1.0 1.1 nI = 1.07(nI )opt

1.2 1.3 QI /(QI )opt

Fig. 3. Cavitation ratio plotted as a function of the flow rate for a PO230-type hydraulic turbine (for notations, see Fig. 1).

a Francis high-speed (Fig. 2), and a Francis low-speed hydraulic turbine (Fig. 3). The curves in Figs. 1 3 show that our method that takes into account the blade flow separation and draft-tube energy losses gives better agreement between calculated and experimental cavitation ratios. Especially at high flow rates, where the method of [1] gives overestimated values for cr, our method shows better agreement with experiment.

REFERENCES
1. G. I. Topazh, An Analysis of Integrated Hydraulic Characteristics of Hydraulic Machines [in Russian], Izd. LGU, Leningrad (1989). 2. I. . tinberg and B. S. Raukhman, Hydrodynamics of Hydraulic Turbines [in Russian], Mashinostroenie, Leningrad (1978). 3. G. Yu. Stepanov, Blade Cascade Hydrodynamics [in Russian], Moscow (1962).