Today, the turbomachinery engineering plays a vital role in the field of air breathing propulsion, most importantly the components like compressor, turbine and its possible numerical strategies to improve the overall efficiency especially in the transonic flow conditions. The main objective of this paper is to address the numerical solution for most uncertain problem like unsteady and non-uniform flow across the axial-flow compressor. The axial-flow compressor distorted flow problem is modeled and analyzed by means of a systematic three-dimensional numerical approach. Particularly, the rotor inflow instability implications of an axial compressor stage are carried out. Geometry is created using ROTOR-37 coordinates for numerical analysis and the results are validated in contradiction of experimental data available from literature, by imposing various combinations of Mach numbers from 0.8 to 1.2 and the engine mass flow rate of incoming air. The results highlighted that the rotor blade main distortion effect was noticed at near the tip region and as well as the hub corners of the blade. Numerical simulations also revealed that due to the distortion influence, the stream flow separation on pressure side of the blade is more. Moreover, these calculated figures have more significance for better aero-mechanical features of axial-flow compressor.
The aerodynamic performance and pressure ratio of modern aircraft engine compressor are degrading due to unsteady flow distorted aerodynamic loads and complex phenomena in the blade tip. This paper attempts to improve the performance of modern axial flow transonic compressor stage under distorted flow conditions by incorporating the combination of groove casing, tip injection technique with surface roughness effects. This is performed for the Mach number ranging between 0.8 and 1.3. The obtained numerical results are compared with experimental studies and found to be in good agreement. Through the numerical analysis, the compressor stage flow interaction with the shock waves as well as vortex formation and boundary layer separation is studied in detail. While evaluating the performance of the axial flow compressor, more emphasis is given to the flow properties like pressure, density, temperature, velocity, etc. The performance improvement is observed at a particular Mach number for a specified aerodynamic flow property.