This chapter underscores the significance of investigating compressor internal flows in modern aircraft engines, where enhanced performance requirements extend beyond merely increasing thrust to ensuring safety, reliability, cost-effectiveness, and environmental sustainability. Understanding the intricate flow mechanisms within the compressor is thus critical to advancing its aerodynamic design and overall engine performance.The complexity of internal compressor flows arises from the combined effects of rotation, strong curvature, and endwall-blade interactions, resulting in highly three-dimensional and unsteady flow fields. Key challenges include corner separation near the blade hub and tip leakage flows, both of which contribute significantly to energy loss and reduce stability. Under high-load conditions, these issues become even more pronounced, creating substantial barriers to achieving high-performance compressor designs.In addressing these challenges, this chapter reviews three main research approaches—theoretical analysis, experimental measurement, and numerical simulation. While theoretical methods offer fundamental insights, they are limited in capturing the full complexity of real flow phenomena. Experimental techniques provide reliable data but often incur high costs, extended testing periods, and difficulties in capturing detailed structures within the boundary layer. By contrast, numerical simulation, particularly with the ongoing improvement in computational capabilities, presents a more flexible and cost-effective avenue for investigating internal flows. However, conventional Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) models, constrained by assumptions of isotropic and equilibrium turbulence, struggle to accurately predict large-scale flow separations and complex vortex dynamics under high-load conditions.To overcome these limitations, the chapter highlights the trend toward high-fidelity simulation techniques. While Direct Numerical Simulation (DNS) and Large Eddy Simulation (LES) can, in principle, resolve the intricate flow physics, their enormous computational costs at high Reynolds numbers currently limit their direct application to engineering problems. Hybrid RANS/LES methods, such as Detached-Eddy Simulation (DES), present a more feasible compromise. By applying RANS in near-wall regions and LES in core flow regions, these methods balance accuracy with computational expense, making them promising candidates for capturing intricate flow structures and non-equilibrium turbulence phenomena in high-load compressor environments.As these advanced numerical methods continue to mature, they are poised to enhance our fundamental understanding of complex internal flows and thereby inform the next generation of high-performance compressor designs.

Introduction

章节
发表日期：

2025年

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Ruiyu Li,
Limin Gao,
Lei Zhao

摘要

This chapter underscores the significance of investigating compressor internal flows in modern aircraft engines, where enhanced performance requirements extend beyond merely increasing thrust to ensuring safety, reliability, cost-effectiveness, and environmental sustainability. Understanding the intricate flow mechanisms within the compressor is thus critical to advancing its aerodynamic design and overall engine performance.The complexity of internal compressor flows arises from the combined effects of rotation, strong curvature, and endwall-blade interactions, resulting in highly three-dimensional and unsteady flow fields. Key challenges include corner separation near the blade hub and tip leakage flows, both of which contribute significantly to energy loss and reduce stability. Under high-load conditions, these issues become even more pronounced, creating substantial barriers to achieving high-performance compressor designs.In addressing these challenges, this chapter reviews three main research approaches—theoretical analysis, experimental measurement, and numerical simulation. While theoretical methods offer fundamental insights, they are limited in capturing the full complexity of real flow phenomena. Experimental techniques provide reliable data but often incur high costs, extended testing periods, and difficulties in capturing detailed structures within the boundary layer. By contrast, numerical simulation, particularly with the ongoing improvement in computational capabilities, presents a more flexible and cost-effective avenue for investigating internal flows. However, conventional Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) models, constrained by assumptions of isotropic and equilibrium turbulence, struggle to accurately predict large-scale flow separations and complex vortex dynamics under high-load conditions.To overcome these limitations, the chapter highlights the trend toward high-fidelity simulation techniques. While Direct Numerical Simulation (DNS) and Large Eddy Simulation (LES) can, in principle, resolve the intricate flow physics, their enormous computational costs at high Reynolds numbers currently limit their direct application to engineering problems. Hybrid RANS/LES methods, such as Detached-Eddy Simulation (DES), present a more feasible compromise. By applying RANS in near-wall regions and LES in core flow regions, these methods balance accuracy with computational expense, making them promising candidates for capturing intricate flow structures and non-equilibrium turbulence phenomena in high-load compressor environments.As these advanced numerical methods continue to mature, they are poised to enhance our fundamental understanding of complex internal flows and thereby inform the next generation of high-performance compressor designs.