FUTURE - Flutter-free Turbomachinery Blades
Overview
Background & policy context:
In modern aircraft engine design, where the driving forces are increasing aircraft safety, lowering weight, raising performance and cost-effective manufacturing, the challenge is to optimise for conflicting aerodynamic and structural demands. Increasingly thinner, lighter, but more loaded blades substantially raise the vulnerability towards flow induced vibrations such as flutter, leading to a high damage potential. By advancing the state-of-theart in flutter prediction capabilities and design rules, the FUTURE project will lead to short term benefits in terms of decreased development cost in current engine programs, reduced weight and thus fuel consumption, and increased ability to efficiently manage flutter problems occurring on engines at service.
In order to meet the ambitious goals of the FUTURE project all major European aero-engine manufacturers as well as relevant academic partners in the field of turbo-machinery aero-elasticity are gathered. The project involves a total of 25 partners and is led by KTH. Spanning a project time of 4 years the overall budget is € 10.7 million.
Objectives:
Mid-term and long-term benefits are that improved analysis and design aero-mechanical methods for aggressive lightweight blade design are an enabling factor for high efficiency future environmental friendly aero-engines and gas turbines with maintained safety. In combination with a reduced time-to-market the project outcomes will have a strong impact on the competitiveness for the European aero-engine module and stationary gas turbines manufacturers participating in the project. The project will give the partners access to experimental data that are not available in any other company in the world.
Methodology:
Different work packages are interconnected to give a coherent and clear progress of the state of the art of aero-elasticity in turbo-machines. The different activities in the FUTURE-project can be summarised as:
- Eight interconnected turbine and compressor experiments (using rotating and static rigs) will be performed, and;
- combined with numerical modelling of vibrating blades together with the surrounding flow interfering with the vibrating structure;
- Results from all the activities in the project will lead to a more coherent view and a better physical understanding of the flutter phenomena in turbo-machines. The high-quality vibration- and unsteady pressure measurements in cascade and rotating rig settings foreseen in the FUTURE project will constitute worldwide leading edge technology and provide the European aerospace universities, research institutes and industry with a distinctive competitive advantage in the aero-elasticity field.
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