Kusuo Okuma

Air/Water Two-Phase Flow Performance of Contra-Rotating Axial Flow Pump and Rotational Speed Control of Rear Rotor

An application of contra-rotating rotors, consisting of front and rear rotors rotating in the opposite direction from each other, has been proposed against a demand for developing a higher specific speed axial flow pump with a more compact structure, higher efficiency and higher cavitation performance. As axial flow pumps are used for standby operations of air-lock and air/water mixing discharge to prevent floods, air/water two-phase flow performance of the contra-rotating pump has to be also investigated. In the present paper, therefore, experimental results on air/water two-phase flow performance of a test pump with contra-rotating rotors are shown and compared with those of a conventional axial flow pump, consisting of a front rotor and a rear stator. Even under two-phase flow conditions head characteristic curve of the contra-rotating type has a more strongly negative slope than that of the conventional type. The contra-rotating type maintains higher head and higher efficiency even in the low flow rate range and vice versa in the high flow rate range. This result will be discussed by considering the change of outlet flow from front rotor due to two-phase flow with the help of observed air behavior in the rotors. Then effects of changes of rear rotor rotational speed different from front rotor speed, which is an advantage of the contra-rotating axial flow pump, on two-phase flow performance are examined. Under the condition of constant ratio of air to water flow rates, the head rise of the rear rotor linearly increases with rear rotor rotational speed. Air/water two-phase flow performance of the contra-rotating axial flow pump can be improved by this control procedure for the rear rotor rotational speed.Copyright

Influences of Impeller Diameter and Diffuser Blades on Air-Water Two-Phase Flow Performance of Centrifugal Pump

A tandem arrangement of double rotating cascades and single diffuser cascade, proposed as a centrifugal pump with high performance in air-water two-phase flow condition, yields lower head due to the smallness of the impeller outlet in comparison with a impeller with large outlet diameter and no diffuser. Influences of impeller diameter change and installation of diffuser blades on two-phase flow performance were experimentally investigated under the case of the same volute casing. As the result, the similarity law of the diameter of impeller having the similar blade geometry and the rotational speed is satisfied even in two-phase flow condition. Comparing pump performances between a large impeller without diffuser blades and a small one with diffuser blades, higher two-phase flow performance is obtained by controlling the rotational speed of a small impeller with diffuser blades in the range of small water flow rates, while a large impeller with no diffuser gives high performance in the range of high water flow rate and small air flow rate.Copyright

On Applicability of Darrieus-type Cross Flow Water Turbine for Abandoned Hydro and Tidal Powers

Publisher Summary Based on experimental and computational results of ducted Darrieus-type water turbines, the applicability is proposed for utilizing hydro and tidal powers with extra-low head that have been abandoned because of poor cost-effectiveness as compared with conventional type turbines.The guiding principles for investigating the appropriate site and designing the electric generation system quantitatively are demonstrated as useful data. If the available head of a river and wasted flow sites or the available tidal level difference in a coastal site is obtained, then the appropriate turbine size and system could be designed, and the amount of power generation could also be estimated from the proposed procedure.

Experimental and Numerical Investigations on Performances of Darriues-type Hydro Turbine with Inlet Nozzle

Low head hydropower is one of realistic renewable energies. The Darrieus-type hydro turbine with an inlet nozzle is available for such low head conditions because of its simple structure with easy maintenance. Experimental and numerical studies are carried out in order to examine the effects of gap distances between the runner pitch circle and two edges of inlet nozzle on turbine performances. By selecting narrower gaps of left and right edges, the performance could be improved. From the results of two dimensional numerical simulations, the relation between the performance and flow behaviors around the Darrieus blade are discussed to obtain the guideline of appropriate inlet nozzle design.

Experimental Study on Adjustment of Inlet Nozzle Section to Flow Rate Variation for Darrieus-type Hydro-Turbine

A two dimensional Darrieus-type turbine has been proposed for the hydropower utilization of extra-low head less than 2m. In a practical use of Darrieus-type hydro-turbine, head and flow rate may be varied temporally and seasonally. Considering that the cost advantage is required for the low head hydro turbine system, the Darrieus turbine should be operated with high efficiency in the wider range of flow rate possibly by using an additional device with simpler mechanism. In the present paper, an adjustment of inlet nozzle section by lowering the inlet nozzle height is proposed to obtain the preferable inlet velocity in low flow rate conditions. Effects of resulting spanwise partial inlet flow are investigated. Finally, an effective modification of inlet nozzle height over flow rate variation is shown.

Limiting Streamlines Measurement in Contra-Rotating Axial Flow Pump

An application of contra-rotating rotors, in which a rear rotor is in tandem with a front one and these rotors rotate in the opposite direction each other, has been proposed against a demand for developing higher specific speed axial flow pump. It is necessary to understand the internal flow behavior for higher performance design. In the present study, limiting streamlines on the blade passage walls were observed by multi-colored oil-film method at design and partial flow rates. The flow behaviors are discussed by observed results of limiting streamlines with measured results of blade-to-blade velocity distribution by Laser Doppler velocimetry and static head distributions on casing wall by pressure sensors.

Study on Design of Air-water Two-phase Flow Centrifugal Pump Based on Similarity Law

Abstract A conventional centrifugal pump causes a drastic deterioration of air-water two-phase flow performances even at an air-water two-phase flow condition of inlet void fraction less than 10% in the range of relatively low water flow rate. Then we have developed a two-phase flow centrifugal pump which consists of a tandem arrangement of double rotating cascades and blades of outer cascade have higher outlet angle more than 90 o . In design of the two-phase flow pump for various sized and operating conditions, similarity relations of geometric dimensions to hydraulic performances is very useful. The similarity relations of rotational speed, impeller diameter and blade height are investigated for the developed impeller in the present paper. As the results, the similarity law of rotational speed and impeller diameter is clarified experimentally even in two-phase flow condition. In addition, influences of blade height on air-water two-phase flow performances indicate a little difference from the similarity relations.

Flow Measurement at Partial Flow Rate With LDV Around Rear Rotor of Contra-Rotating Axial Flow Pump

An application of contra-rotating rotors, in which a rear rotor is employed in tandem with a front one and these rotors rotate in the opposite direction each other, has been proposed against a demand for developing higher specific speed axial flow pump. The internal flow field of pump should be considered in the design for higher performance and more stable operation. The flow field in contra-rotating axial flow pump was measured with LDV and wall pressure measurements. In the present paper, the experimental results are shown and the flow behaviors would be discussed.Copyright

Development of air/water two-phase flow centrifugal pump and its operating characteristics

A centrifugal impeller, the pumping action of which could be highly kept even at an air-water two-phase flow condition of inlet void fraction more than 30% in the region of relatively high water flow rate, has been developed. In the present paper, the design concept of two-phase flow impeller is described, at first, with experimental results. The short bladed forward impeller with high outlet blade angle was decided to keep theoretical head higher even in two-phase flow condition and to disperse the air accumulating region on the suction blade surface by the water jet flow coming from the pressure side. Furthermore, the tandem arrangement of outer and inner rotating cascades with the same blade numbers was adopted to suppress the rotating stall phenomena appearing in the case of a single stage of outer cascade. It should be noted that these results were obtained with operating a boost pump installed upstream of mixing section of air and water, that is not an actual operation of two-phase flow pump. Secondly, the operating characteristics of this two-phase flow pump with change of air flow rate were investigated experimentally without operating the boost pump. As the trajectory of operating point with increasing air flow rate appears along the resistance curve of piping system, the impossibility of pumping occurs at lower air flow rate even though pump head takes a positive value at high air flow rate with increasing water flow rate. It is recognized that it is necessary to improve two-phase flow head characteristic curves in the region of low water flow rate to operate in wider two-phase flow conditions.© 2003 ASME

Tentative Study on Performance of Darriues-Type Hydroturbine Operated in Small Open Water Channel

The development of small hydropower is one of the realistic and preferable utilizations of renewable energy, but the extra-low head hydropower less than 2 m is almost undeveloped yet for some reasons. The authors have developed several types of Darrieus-type hydro-turbine system, and among them, the Darrieus-turbine with a wear and a nozzle installed upstream of turbine is so far in success to obtain more output power, i.e. more shaft torque, by gathering all water into the turbine. However, there can several cases exist, in which installing the wear covering all the flow channel width is unrealistic. Then, in the present study, the hydraulic performances of Darrieus-type hydro-turbine with the inlet nozzle is investigated, putting alone in a small open channel without upstream wear. In the experiment, the five-bladed Darrieus-type runner with the pitch-circle diameter of 300 mm and the blade span of 300 mm is vertically installed in the open channel with the width of 1,200 mm. The effectiveness of the shape of the inlet nozzle is also examined using two types of two-dimensional symmetric nozzle, the straight line nozzle (SL nozzle) with the converging angle of 45 degrees and the half diameter curved nozzle (HD nozzle) whose radius is a half diameter of runner pitch circle. Inlet and outlet nozzle widths are in common for the both nozzles, which are 540 mm and 240 mm respectively. All the experiments are carried out under the conditions with constant flow rate and downstream water level, and performances are evaluated by measured output torque and the measured head difference between the water levels upstream and downstream of the turbine. As a result, it is found that the output power is remarkably increased by installing the inlet nozzle, and the turbine with SL nozzle produces larger power than that with HD nozzle. However, the peak efficiency is deteriorated in both cases. The speed ratio defined by the rotor speed divided by the downstream water velocity at the peak efficiency is larger in both cases with the inlet nozzle, partly due to the increase of inflow velocity into the turbine. In order to understand the cause of the differences of power, i.e. torque characteristics of the turbine with SL and HD nozzles, twodimensional CFD simulation is carried out. It is found that the instantaneous torque variation is important for the overall turbine performances, indicating the possibility of further performance improvement through the optimization of nozzle geometry.