Axial-flow pump hydraulic analysis and experiment under different swept-angles of guide vane

Abstract: Based on the computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software, this paper studied the influence of the post guide vane under different sweep angles on the hydraulic performance of the axial flow pump device. The purpose was that through changing the angle of blade forward and back sweeping, the post guide vane could as much as possibly recover the velocity circulation of the impeller outlet, at the same time, the hydraulic loss of the guide vane could be not too large, so as to improve the hydraulic characteristics of the axial flow pump device. This paper used the Turbo-Grid software to build the model and carry out the mesh division of the post guide vane and the impeller, used the Pro/E software to build the models of the inlet straight pipe with water-guiding cone and the standard 60°outlet pipe, and then used the ICEM to carry out the structured-grid division. Then, the hydraulic property of the axial flow pump device was analyzed through the CFX software. There were 6 different post guide vane sweeping schemes, which were forward sweep 24°, forward sweep 16°, forward sweep 8°, 0°, back sweep 8°and back sweep 16°. Numerical simulation of the axial flow pump device adopted the standard k-ε model, and each sweeping scheme of post guide vane had 8 flow points including 280, 300, 320, 340, 360, 380, 400 and 420 L/s. The influence of different post guide vane sweeping angles on the energy characteristics of the axial flow pump was analyzed under the design condition and the non-design condition. Then the hydraulic loss of the post guide vane and the outlet pipe was calculated and analyzed. Finally, the experimental study of the energy performance of the axial flow pump device was carried out. The results showed that, the test performance curve trend was consistent with the numerical simulation; the flow-head curve showed a little deviation under small flow, other parts fitted well, and the flow-efficiency curve did not fit so well, but the error between the test data and the numerical data was within 3% that was very small. The results from numerical simulation and experimental study had been mutually authenticated. The results of the study showed that: under small flow condition and near design condition, the energy performances of axial flow pump device of different sweep angles had comparatively large difference, on the other hand, the energy performances were almost the same under large flow condition; under the design condition, the flow separation of the airfoil tail of back sweep guide vane was very serious, and hydraulic loss of the guide vane was very large; the guide vane of forward sweep 16° could as much as possibly recover velocity circulation of the impeller outlet, also its hydraulic loss was the smallest. Therefore, the guide vane of forward sweep 16° has a good effect to improve the energy performance of the axial flow pump device.