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Experimental and Numerical Research on Strengthening the Performance of Wave Rotor Equipment with Curved Passages

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Abstract

The wave rotor technology is an energy exchanging approach that achieves efficient energy transfer between gases without using mechanical components. The wave rotor technology has been successfully utilized in gas turbine cycle systems, gas expansion refrigeration and a variety of other industrial domains, yielding numerous researches and application outcomes. The structure of wave rotor passages inside which the energy exchange between gases is realized has an important impact on the equipment performance. In this study, based on gas wave ejection technology, the first application trials of an expansion wave rotor with curved passages were conducted. Additionally, the performance enhancing effect and mechanism of curved passages on the energy exchanging process were studied precisely by the combination of experimental and three-dimensional numerical simulation methods.

The experimental results demonstrate that the curved passage rotor (CIR rotor) employed in this research has a maximum isentropic efficiency of 61.6%, and the CIR rotor achieves higher efficiency than the straight passage rotor (STR rotor) on all working conditions in this study. Compared with the STR rotor, the maximum efficiency improving ratio of CIR rotor can exceed 14.2% at each experimental expansion ratio, and the maximum relative increments of ejection rate are more than 5%. In addition, the CIR rotor can also effectively increase the proportion of static pressure in total pressure of the medium-pressure gas, and reduce the device power consumption. The three-dimensional numerical investigations revealed the principle of gas ejection in the wave rotors and explained why the CIR rotor performed better. According to the numerical findings, the curved passages of the CIR rotor may effectively minimize various energy losses created in the processes of high-pressure gas incidence, exhausting flow in nozzle, and high-speed gas flow in the passages.

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Abbreviations

c p :

specific heat capacity at constant pressure/J·(kg·K)−1

d :

middle diameter of rotor/mm

\(\vec F\) :

external volume forces/N

h :

Passage height/mm

l :

Passage axial length/mm

m :

mass flow rate/kg·s−1

n :

rotor rotational speed/r·min−1

P con :

gas loading power consumption/W

P s :

noload rotating power consumption of device/W

P w :

total power consumption in the working state/W

p :

total pressure/Pa

p d :

dynamic pressure/Pa

p h :

high pressure inlet/Pa

p l :

low pressure inlet/Pa

p m :

middle pressure outlet/Pa

p s :

static pressure/Pa

p t :

total pressure/Pa

T :

temperature/K

t :

time/s

t open :

passage actual opening time/s

t po :

time for passage full opening/ms

\(\vec u\) :

velocity vector/m·s−1

W com :

the actual work consumption for compressing low-pressure gas/W

W coms :

the isentropic work consumption for compressing low-pressure gas/W

W ep :

expansion work/W

W eps :

expansion work generated in an isentropic expansion process/W

w :

Passage width/mm

x :

number of passages

α :

expansion ratio

β :

compression ratio

γ :

adiabatic index

ξ :

the ejection rate

η :

the efficiencies of compression and expansion processes

η com :

isentropic efficiency of compressing low-pressure gas

η com :

isentropic efficiency of the expansion

η ep :

work outputting process

θ :

blade thickness/mm

φ pin :

the inlet angle of passage/(°)

φ pout :

the outlet angle of passage/(°)

φ t :

viscous dissipation/m2·s−3

φ tma :

average viscous dissipation/m2·s−3

ψ ef :

efficiency improvement ratio

ψ er :

ejection rate improvement ratio

ψ msp :

static pressure lifting ratio

ψ com :

relative compression ratio

ω tma :

average vorticity intensity/s−1

ω t :

vorticity intensity/s−1

CIR:

curved-passage rotor

GWE:

gas wave ejector

STR:

straight-passage rotor

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Acknowledgment

This study is supported by the National Key Research and Development Program of China (No. 2018YFA0704600)

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chemical Machinery, Dalian University of Technology, Dalian, 116012, China

    Yiming Zhao, Haoran Li & Dapeng Hu

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  1. Yiming Zhao
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Correspondence to Dapeng Hu.

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Zhao, Y., Li, H. & Hu, D. Experimental and Numerical Research on Strengthening the Performance of Wave Rotor Equipment with Curved Passages. J. Therm. Sci. 32, 59–80 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11630-022-1704-8

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