Coupled Torsional Vibration and Fatigue Damage of Turbine Generator Due to Grid Disturbance

Abstract

Crack failures continually occur in shafts of turbine generator, where grid disturbance is an important cause. To estimate influences of grid disturbance, coupled torsional vibration and fatigue damage of turbine generator shafts are analyzed in this work, with a case study in a 600MW steam unit in China. The analysis is the following: (i) coupled system is established with generator model and finite element method (FEM)-based shafts model, where the grid disturbance is signified by fluctuation of generator outputs and the shafts model is formed with lumped mass model (LMM) and continuous mass model (CMM), respectively; (ii) fatigue damage is evaluated in the weak location of the shafts through local torque response computation, stress calculation, and fatigue accumulation; and (iii) failure-prevention approach is formed by solving the inverse problem in fatigue evaluation. The results indicate that the proposed scheme with continuous mass model can acquire more detailed and accurate local responses throughout the shafts compared with the scheme without coupled effects or the scheme using lumped mass model. Using the coupled torsional vibration scheme, fatigue damage caused by grid disturbance is evaluated and failure prevention rule is formed.