• Aerospace Engineering and Technology
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• v.3 no.2
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• pp.72-80
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• 2004

LOX pump is one of the sub-assemblies constructing turbopump unit. In the current study, static structural analysis on such rotating parts as impeller and inducer has been carried out. Three major factors which can affect the structural stability of the rotating parts of LOX pump, are temperature, pressure, and centrifugal force. The effect of each factor was preliminarily investigated, then the analysis under the consideration of the combined loading conditions has been carried out. The major factor that affects the structural stability was proved to be temperature. The analyses of the combined cases showed that the designed impeller and inducer had reasonable safety margins, which means that the impeller and the inducer will be stable in static structural strength. Although there was no problem in the structural strength of the impeller and the inducer, a model analysis should be followed in order to verify the interference between the rotating part and the inner surface of casing.

• 유체기계공업학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2002.12a
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• pp.33-40
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• 2002

The hydraulic performance analysis of a pump system composed of an inducer and impeller for the application on turbopumps has been performed using three-dimensional Wavier-Stokes equations. A simple mixing-plane method and a full interaction method are used to simulate inducer/impeller interactions. The computations adopting two methods show almost similar results due to the weak interaction between the inducer and impeller since the inducer outlet blade angle is rather small. But, because the inducer and the impeller are closely spaced near the shroud region at the interface, flow angles at the impeller inlet show different results between two methods. Thus, the full interaction method predicted about $2\%$ higher pump performance than the mixing-plane method. And the effects of prewhirl at the impeller inlet are also investigated. As the inlet flow angle is increased, the head rise and the efficiency are decreased. The computational results are compared with experimental ones. The computational results at the design point show good agreements with experimental data. But the computation was found to under-predict the head rise at high mass flow rates compared to the experiment, further study must be followed in terms of the computation and experiment.

• The KSFM Journal of Fluid Machinery
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• v.7 no.4 s.25
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• pp.16-23
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• 2004

Hydraulic performance and cavitation characteristics of fuel pump in turbopump were studied experimentally. This fuel pump has a centrifugal impeller with a separate inducer. In this paper, static pressure distribution of inducer was examined in non-cavitation and cavitation conditions. As cavitation came, the rising curve of static pressure in front of inducer was lightened because blade lodging did. In result, this offered the mechanism that recirculation zone could be small in case that recirculation was generated in low flow rate.

• International Journal of Fluid Machinery and Systems
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.50-57
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• 2010

The attachment of inducer in front of main impeller is a powerful method to improve cavitation performance. Cavitation surge oscillation, however, often occurs at partial flow rate and extremely low suction pressure. As the cavitation surge oscillation with low frequency of about 10 Hz occurs in a close relation between the inlet backflow cavitation and the growth of blade cavity into the throat section of blade passage, one method of installing an axi-asymmetrical plate upstream of inducer has been proposed to suppress the oscillation. The inlet flow distortion due to the axi-asymmetrical plate makes different elongations of cavities on all blades, which prevent the flow from becoming simultaneously unstable at all throat sections. In the present study, changes of the suppression effects with the axial distance between the inducer inlet and the plate and the changes with the blockage ratios of plate area to the cross-sectional area of inducer inlet are investigated for helical inducers with tip blade angles of $8^{\circ}$ and $14^{\circ}$. Then a conceivable application will be proposed to suppress the cavitation surge oscillation by installing axi-asymmetrical inlet plate.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2001.06e
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• pp.625-630
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• 2001

The inducers in liquid-rocket engines are to increase the inlet pressure of the pump to avoid any malfunction due to cavitation. Inducers are typically designed to be operated with some amount of cavitation for the compactness of the turbopump system. Also, inducers are designed to produce low headrise to prevent the decrease of the overall pump efficiency due to the low efficiency of inducers. In the present paper, a computational study on the hydrodynamic behavior of the inducer for the rocket-engine turbopump are presented including the effect of the mass flow rate under the constant rotational speed. As the mass flow rate is decreased, the inducer showed better performance with strong back flows which may have deleterious effects upon the anti-cavitation ability. But the adopted inducer showed very low headrise with high volume flow rates, which may be caused by the small passage area near the trailing edge. The modified version of the present inducer is proposed and numerically evaluated, which in turn showed better results.

• 유체기계공업학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2005.12a
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• pp.348-353
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• 2005

A cryogenic test facility has been developed to perform inducer and pump tests using liquid nitrogen. Performance tests of a turbopump in the maximum 50ton-thrust class can be performed with cryogenic fluid in the facility which operates at a temperature around $-196^{\circ}C$ with the rotational speed up to 30,000rpm. To verify the reliability of the cryogenic pump test facility, hydraulic performance tests of an inducer were accomplished, and their results were compared with the result from a water test The results confirm the reliability of the cryogenic test facility, and it is expected to contribute for on-going development of a turbopump for liquid rocket engines.

• The KSFM Journal of Fluid Machinery
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• v.9 no.4 s.37
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• pp.20-26
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• 2006

A cryogenic test facility has been developed to perform inducer and pump tests using liquid nitrogen. Performance tests of a turbopump in the maximum 50ton-thrust class can be performed with cryogenic fluid in the facility which operates at a temperature around -196oC with the rotational speed up to 30,000rpm To verify the reliability of the cryogenic pump test facility, hydraulic performance tests of an inducer were accomplished, and their results were compared with the result from a water test. The results confirm the reliability of the cryogenic test facility, and it is expected to contribute for on-going development of a turbopump for liquid rocket engines.

• 유체기계공업학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2005.12a
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• pp.359-364
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• 2005

Centrifugal pump shows the strongest secondary flow. Wake is formed near pressure surface close to hub at impeller exit for centrifugal pump impeller. Pressure gradient drives secondary flow in the inducer region, while in the remaining region the following sources drive together: > Pressure gradient > Coriolis force Low-momentum fluid near suction surface hub moves toward pressure surface hub in mixed-flow pump impeller. Tip leakage vortex dominate secondary flow in axial-flow pump impeller. Tip leakage vortex dominate secondary flow in axial-flow in axial-flow pump impeller

• International Journal of Fluid Machinery and Systems
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• v.3 no.2
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• pp.122-128
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• 2010

The attachment of inducer in front of main impeller is a powerful method to improve cavitation performance; however, cavitation surge oscillation with low frequency occurs with blade cavity growing to each throat section of blade passage simultaneously. Then, one conceptual method of installing suction axi-asymmetrical plate has been proposed so as to keep every throat passage away from being unstable at once, and the effect on suppression of the oscillation were investigated. In the present study, cavitation behaviors in the inducer is observed with distributing multi-cameras circumferentially, recording simultaneously and reconstructing multi-photos on one plane field as moving a linear cascade. Observed results are utilized for discussion with other measuring results as casing wall pressure distribution. Then the suppression mechanism of oscillation by installing axi-asymmetrical inlet plate will be clarified in more details.

• Journal of Mechanical Science and Technology
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.481-490
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• 2004

Steady state flow calculations are executed for turbo-pump inducers of modern design to validate the performance of Tascflow code. Hydrodynamic performance of inducers is evaluated and structure of the passage flow and leading edge recirculation are also investigated. Calculated results show good coincidence with experimental data of static pressure performance and velocity profiles over the leading edge. Upstream recirculation, tip leakage and vortex flow at the blade tip and near leading edge are main sources of pressure loss. Amount of pressure loss from the upstream to the leading edge corresponds to that of whole pressure loss through the blade passage. The viscous loss is considerably large due to the strong secondary flow. There appears more stronger leading edge recirculation for the backswept inducer, and this increases the pressure loss. However, blade loading near the leading edge is considerably reduced and cavitation inception delayed.