This work is a feasibility study of a 19-passenger hybrid-electric aircraft, to serve the short-haul segment within the 200–600 nautical miles. Its ambition is to answer some dominating research questions, during the evaluation and design of aircraft based on alternative propulsion architectures. The potential entry into service (EIS) is foreseen beyond 2030. A literature review is performed to identify similar concepts under research and development. After the requirements' definition, the first level of conceptual design is employed. The objective of design selections is driven by the need to reduce CO 2 emissions and accommodate aircraft electrification with boundary layer ingestion engines. Based on a set of assumptions, a methodology for the sizing of the hybrid-electric aircraft is described to explore the basis of the design space, incorporating a parametric analysis for the consideration of boundary layer ingestion effects. Additionally, a methodology for the energy storage positioning is provided to highlight the multidisciplinary aspects between the sizing of an aircraft, the selected architecture (series/parallel partial hybrid), and the storage characteristics. The results show that it is not possible to fulfill the initial design requirements (600 nmi) with a fully-electric aircraft configuration, due to the far-fetched battery necessities. It is also highlighted that compliance with airworthiness standards is favored by switching to hybrid-electric aircraft configurations and relaxing the design requirements (targeted range, payload, battery technology). Finally, the lower degree of hybridization (40%) is observed to have a higher energy efficiency (−12% energy consumption) compared to the higher degree of hybridization (50%) and greater CO 2 reduction, with respect to the conventional configuration.

This paper presents the computational methodology and experimental investigations accomplished to enhance the efficiency of a turbine stage by applying non-axisymmetric profiling on the rotor hub wall. The experimental setup was a two-stage axial turbine, which was tested at “LISA” test facility at ETH Zurich. The first stage was considered to create the flow history for the second stage, which was the target of the optimization. The hub cavity of the second stage was designed with large dimensions as a requirement of a steam turbine. The goal was to optimize the interaction of the cavity leakage flow with the rotor passage flow to reduce the losses and increase efficiency. The computational optimization was completed using a genetic algorithm coupled with an artificial neural network on the second stage of the test turbine. Unsteady time-accurate simulations were performed using in-house developed “MULTI3” solver. Besides implementing all geometrical details (such as hub and tip cavities and fully 3D blade geometries) from the experimental setup into the computational model, it was learned that the unsteady upstream effect could not be neglected. A novel approach was introduced using unsteady inlet boundary conditions to consider the multistage effect while reducing the computational cost to half. The importance of this implementation was tested by performing a steady simulation on the optimized geometry. The predicted efficiency gain from steady simulations was 4.5 times smaller (and negligible) compared to the unsteady approach. Excluding the cavity geometry was also assessed in a different simulation setup showing 3.9% over-prediction in the absolute efficiency value. Comprehensive steady and unsteady measurements were performed utilizing pneumatic, fast response aerodynamic probe (FRAP), and fast response entropy probe (FENT) on the baseline and profiled test cases. The end wall profiling was found to be successful in weakening the strength of the hub passage vortex by a 19% reduction in the under-over turning. As a result, the blockage was reduced near the hub region leading to more uniform mass flow distribution along the span. The flow angle deviations at the higher span position were also corrected due to better control of the flow angles. Furthermore, the improvements were confirmed by reductions in entropy, secondary kinetic energy, and pressure unsteadiness. The accurate computational implementations led to an excellent agreement between the predicted and measured efficiency gain.

This study describes the design, development, and testing of a miniature fast response aerodynamic probe (FRAP) with four sensors (4S), which are able to perform measurements in the unsteady three-dimensional flow field. Moreover, the calibration and first results with the newly developed probe are provided. The miniature FRAP-4S demonstrates a 3 mm tip diameter, offering a 25% reduction in diameter size, in comparison to a first-generation FRAP-4S, without any loss in terms of measurement bandwidth. The 3 mm outer casing of the probe is additively manufactured with a high-precision binder jetting technique. In terms of aerodynamic performance, the probe demonstrates high angular sensitivity up to ± 18 deg incidence angle in both directions. To evaluate the measurement accuracy of the newly developed FRAP-4S, measurements are performed at the Laboratory for Energy Conversion (LEC) in both a round axisymmetric jet and an one-and-a-half stage, unshrouded and highly loaded axial turbine configuration. Turbulence measurements performed with the miniature FRAP-4S are compared against hot-wire studies in round free-jets found in the literature. Good agreement in both trends but also absolute values is demonstrated. Moreover, the performance of the probe is compared against traditional instrumentation developed at LEC, namely, miniature pneumatic and FRAP-2S probes. The results indicate that the FRAP-4S, despite its larger size in comparison to the other probes tested, can resolve the main flow patterns, with the highest deviations occuring in the presence of highly skewed and sheared flow. Furthermore, the additively manufactured probe was proven to be robust after more than 50 hours of testing in the representative turbine environment configuration. Finally, it should be highlighted that the newly developed FRAP reduces measurement time by a factor of three in comparison to FRAP-2S, which directly translates to reduced development time and thus cost during the turbomachinery development phase.

Non-synchronous pressure and temperature fluctuations at the hub cavity of a turbine stage are the main focus of this study. Cavity modes are unsteady fluctuations generated at the cavity exit due to instabilities in this region. The cavity modes carried into the main flow impose an unsteady flow field in the rotor passages, which varies the passage-wise flow parameters considerably. A two-stage axial turbine was designed and tested in the “LISA” test facility at ETH Zurich. A reference case with baseline geometry and a modified case with an axial deflector at the hub cavity exit were tested. Comprehensive unsteady pressure and temperature measurements were performed using fast response aerodynamic (FRAP) and entropy probes (FENT), respectively. In addition, 12 fast response unsteady pressure transducers were mounted on the stationary wall of the cavity exit to measure the main characteristic parameters of the cavity modes. Full annular unsteady simulations were also carried out for both cases to support the experiments. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) successfully predicted the effect of cavity modes on both frequency and amplitude of the fluctuations. The cavity modes indicated fluctuation amplitudes up to eight times of the blade passing fluctuations at the cavity exit. The analysis shows that the convected cavity modes alter the efficiency of different rotor passages by redistributing the mass flow and the losses resulting in a drop in overall efficiency. This work suggests that implementing a small axial deflector at the hub cavity exit would completely eliminate the cavity modes leading to a reduced pressure unsteadiness and enhanced efficiency.

The largest share of electricity production worldwide belongs to steam turbines. However, the increase of renewable energy production has led steam turbines to operate under part load conditions and increase in size. As a consequence, long rotor blades will generate a relative supersonic flow field at the inlet of the last rotor. This paper presents a unique experiment work that focuses at the top 30% of stator exit in the last stage of an low pressure (LP) steam turbine test facility with coarse droplets and high wetness mass fraction under different operating conditions. The measurements were performed with two novel fast response probes: a fast response probe for three-dimensional flow field wet steam measurements and an optical backscatter probe for coarse water droplet measurements ranging from 30 μ m up to 110 μ m in diameter. This study has shown that the attached bow shock at the rotor leading edge is the main source of interblade row interactions between the stator and rotor of the last stage. In addition, the measurements showed that coarse droplets are present in the entire stator pitch with larger droplets located at the vicinity of the stator's suction side. Unsteady droplet measurements showed that the coarse water droplets are modulated with the downstream rotor blade-passing period. This set of time-resolved data will be used for in-house computational fluid dynamics (CFD) code development and validation.

This paper examines the applicability of a triple layer of thermochromic liquid crystals (TLCs) for the determination of local heat transfer coefficients using the transient liquid crystal (LC) technique. The experiments were carried out in a narrow impingement channel, typically used for turbine blade cooling applications. Three types of narrow bandwidth LCs (1 °C range) of 35 °C, 38 °C, and 41 °C were individually painted on the target plate of the cooling cavity and the overall paint thickness was accurately determined with an integral coating thickness gauge. The 1D transient heat conduction equation is then implicitly solved for each individual TLC layer on its realistic depth on the painted surface. Local heat transfer coefficients are therefore calculated three times for the same location in the flow improving the measurement accuracy, especially at regions where the LC detection times are too short (stagnation points) or too long (wall-jet regions). The results indicate that if multiple LC layers are used and the paint thickness is not considered, the heat transfer coefficients can be significantly underestimated.

Modern steam turbines need to operate efficiently and safely over a wide range of operating conditions. This paper presents a unique unprecedented set of time-resolved steam flowfield measurements from the exit of the last two stages of a low pressure (LP) steam turbine under various volumetric massflow conditions. The measurements were performed in the steam turbine test facility in Hitachi city in Japan. A newly developed fast response probe equipped with a heated tip to operate in wet steam flows was used. The probe tip is heated through an active control system using a miniature high-power cartridge heater developed in-house. Three different operating points (OPs), including two reduced massflow conditions, are compared and a detailed analysis of the unsteady flow structures under various blade loads and wetness mass fractions is presented. The measurements show that at the exit of the second to last stage the flow field is highly three dimensional. The measurements also show that the secondary flow structures at the tip region (shroud leakage and tip passage vortices) are the predominant sources of unsteadiness at 85% span. The high massflow operating condition exhibits the highest level of periodical total pressure fluctuation compared to the reduced massflow conditions at the inlet of the last stage. In contrast at the exit of the last stage, the reduced massflow operating condition exhibits the largest aerodynamic losses near the tip. This is due to the onset of the ventilation process at the exit of the LP steam turbine. This phenomenon results in three times larger levels of relative total pressure unsteadiness at 93% span, compared to the high massflow condition. This implies that at low volumetric flow conditions the blades will be subjected to higher dynamic load fluctuations at the tip region.