Numerical analysis and diffuser vane shape optimization of a radial compressor with the open-source software su2

Abstract

In recent years, the usage of open-source computational fluid dynamics tools is on a rise both in industry and academia. SU2 is one of these open-source tools. Unlike other open-source alternatives, SU2 is equipped with boundary condition types, solvers and methods that are especially developed for the analysis and design of turbomachinery. The aim of this work is to explore and investigate the capabilities of SU2 in the prediction of performance parameters of radial compressors. Two different single stage shrouded compressor geometries, one with a vaneless diffuser and the other with a vaned diffuser have been investigated with steady state CFD. The compressors were designed by MAN Energy Solutions Schweiz AG. Computational results with SU2 showed a satisfactory agreement with both the experimental data and reference CFD solutions obtained with Fidelity Flow, which is formerly known as Numeca Fine TURBO. Only at the relatively higher mass flow rates the difference between references and SU2 were higher compared to other operating points. After performance parameters were successfully calculated with SU2, the optimization tools that come with SU2 were also used. A 2D adjoint optimization study on the vane of the vaned diffuser was carried out. The study was carried out at a single operating point that is close to choke conditions. The loss generated by the large separated flow region at the suction side of the diffuser vane was reduced by 0.55 % in the optimized geometry using minimal modifications on the existing vane geometry to keep the performance of the compressor intact at other operating points. However, the resulting modification increased the total pressure loss by 0.86 % at one of the design operating points. This performance penalty could be due to the discontinuity in the vane geometry generated by the optimizer. Overall, the study shows that SU2 has the basic numerical schemes and models that are required for the analysis of radial turbomachinery flows and geometry optimization.