Probabilistic CFD Simulation of a High-Pressure Compressor Stage Taking Manufacturing Variability Into Account

Abstract

The present paper addresses a non-deterministic CFD simulation of a high-pressure compressor (HPC) stage. The investigation focuses on the determination of the influence of the manufacturing scatter of compressor blades on the aerodynamic performance of the analyzed HPC stage. A set of 150 blades was scanned using an optical 3D digitizer to obtain a three-dimensional point cloud representing the surface of the blades. Classical profile parameters were identified at several sections of constant spanwise coordinate. The radial stacking of these parameters forms a parameter vector that constructs the airfoil model of each scanned blade. Consequently these parameters were used to define the geometric variability of the entire measured blade set. A statistical analysis of the distribution of these parameters defines the input data of the probabilistic 3D CFD simulation. The Monte-Carlo method is used to identify the scatter of the performance values of the HPC stage and their sensitivity to the geometric variability of profile parameters.