Particle deposition tests were conducted in a turbine deposition facility with an internally staged single-tube combustor to investigate the individual effect of the gas temperature and angle of attack. Sand particles were seeded to the combustor and deposited on a turbine blade with film-cooling holes at temperatures representative of modern engines. Fuel-air ratios were varied from 0.022 to 0.037 to achieve a gas temperature between 1272 and 1668 K. Results show that capture efficiency increased with increasing gas temperature. A dramatic increase in capture efficiency was noted when gas temperature exceeded the threshold. The deposition formed mostly downstream of the film-cooling holes on the pressure surface, while it concentrated on the suction surface at the trailing edge. Deposition tests at angles of attack between 10° and 40° presented changes in both deposition mass and distribution. The capture efficiency increased with the increase in the angle of attack, and simultaneously the growth rate slowed down. On the blade pressure surface, sand deposition was distributed mainly downstream of the film-cooling holes near the trailing edge in the case of the small angle of attack, while it concentrated on the region around the film-cooling holes near the leading edge, resulting in the partial blockage of holes, in the case of the large angle of attack.

Particle deposition could decrease the aerodynamic performance and cooling efficiency of turbine vanes and blades. The particle motion in the flow and its temperature are two important factors affecting its deposition. The size of the particle influences both its motion and temperature. In this study, the motion of particles with the sizes from 1 to 20 μm in the first stage of a turbine are firstly numerically simulated with the steady method, then the particle deposition on the vanes and blades are numerically simulated with the unsteady method based on the critical viscosity model. It is discovered that the particle deposition on vanes mainly formed near the leading and trailing edge on the pressure surface, and the deposition area expands slowly to the whole pressure surface with the particle size increasing. For the particle deposition on blades, the deposition area moves from the entire pressure surface toward the tip with the particle size increasing due to the effect of rotation. For vanes, the particle capture efficiency increases with the particle size increasing since Stokes number and temperature of the particle both increase with its size. For blades, the particle capture efficiency increases firstly and then decreases with the particle size increasing.

In highly loaded tandem compressor cascades, corner separations can still exist. In order to eliminate corner separations in highly loaded tandem compressor cascades, incoming vortex–corner separation interaction mechanism was investigated. Different schemes of the vortex generators, which located at different pitchwise locations and could generate vortexes with different rotation directions, were designed and investigated numerically. Results show that, severe corner separation occurred at the front blade passage of the tandem cascade; by utilizing flow control method of incoming vortex–corner separation interaction, the corner separation could be reduced significantly. The optimal control effect of incoming vortex on corner separation was achieved with anticlockwise rotation and the vortex generator is located right ahead of the leading edge of tandem cascade, a maximum loss coefficient reduction of 21.8% being achieved. Different from single blade configuration, the boundary layer of tandem cascade was regenerated at rear blade suction surface due to the injection flow from blade gap between the two blades. Though corner separations could be reduced at both conditions, the loss of tandem cascade with clockwise incoming vortex is higher than that with anticlockwise vortex, and a smaller corner separation region at suction surface was achieved by utilizing clockwise vortex. The mechanism was that anticlockwise incoming vortex reduced the corner separation but increased secondary flow, while clockwise vortex enhanced passage vortex and decreased secondary flow. For clockwise incoming vortex near pressure surface, the vortex would be divided into two parts at the leading edge of rear blade, one would go through the blade gap and deteriorate flow fluid near rear blade suction surface, the other flowed downstream along pressure surface. The rotation direction of different incoming vortexes became the same as the passage vortex at rear blade passage of tandem cascade, which was mainly due to the effect of secondary flow.

The effect of mainstream velocity and mainstream temperature on the behavior of deposition on a flat plate surface has been investigated experimentally. Molten wax particles were injected to generate particle deposition in a two-phase flow wind tunnel. Tests indicated that deposition occurs mainly at the leading edge and the middle and backward portions of the windward side. The mass of deposition at the leading edge was far more than that on the windward and lee sides. For the windward and lee sides, deposition mass increased as the mainstream velocity was increased for a given particle concentration. Capture efficiency was found to increase initially until the mainstream velocity reaches a certain value, where it begins to drop with mainstream velocity increasing. For the leading edge, capture efficiency followed a similar trend due to deposition spallation and detachment induced by aerodynamic shear at high velocity. Deposition formation was also strongly affected by the mainstream temperature due to its control of particle phase (solid or liquid). Capture efficiency initially increased with increasing mainstream temperature until a certain threshold temperature (near the wax melting point). Subsequently, it began to decrease, for wax detaches from the model surface when subjected to the aerodynamic force at the surface temperature above the wax melting point.

One of the reliable methods of studying engine icing is to carry out testing in an icing wind tunnel. Due to the operational limitations of test facility, model-size scaling is adopted. An icing scaling test method for the rotating cone is established based on the dimensional analysis coupled with similarity theory and evaluated by considering the rotating effect. Similarity parameters are determined in the following five aspects: flow field similarity, droplet trajectory similarity, water catch similarity, heat balance similarity, and rotating characteristics similarity. Experimental icing tests have been performed at rime and glaze ice conditions to evaluate the scaling method in a closed-loop icing wind tunnel. Results show that the maximum error between the reference and scale ice shapes occurs at the stagnant point. On the areas apart from this, there is a significantly smaller error. Hence, the scaling test method is proven to be effective and reliable and can provide a theoretical basis for parameter selection of the ice wind tunnel tests.