A New Test Facility for Testing of Cooled Gasturbine Components

Abstract

A high pressure hot test facility for cooled gas turbine components has been developed for use in turbine cooling research. In this facility, heat transfer tests for a sector of real turbine vanes can be performed under continuous operation. The heat transfer tests are performed at an operating point that is scaled down from the real engine operating point. The compressor can deliver air at the rate of up to 10 kg/s at 20 bars. Air temperatures of up to 1170 K can be achieved by using an oil-fired combustor. Besides conventional instrumentation such as thermocouples and pressure probes, the facility is equipped with an IR-camera to map two-dimensional wall temperature fields. Hot wire anemometry and an LDV system are used to determine mean and fluctuating velocity components. This paper describes design and performance of the test facility as well as the control and measurement equipment. The test and evaluation procedures used for testing of cooled gas turbine vanes are also presented.