Effects of Alternate Leading Edge Cutback on Unsteady Cavitation in 4-Bladed Inducers
- 11 July 2001
- journal article
- Published by ASME International in Journal of Fluids Engineering
- Vol. 123 (4), 762-770
- https://doi.org/10.1115/1.1411969
Abstract
A set of 4-bladed inducers with various amounts of cutback was tested with the aim of suppressing the rotating cavitation by applying alternate leading edge cutback. Unsteady cavitation patterns were observed by means of inlet pressure measurements and high-speed video pictures. It was found that the region with the alternate blade cavitation and asymmetric cavitation were enlarged with the increase of the amount of the cutback. As a result, the region with the rotating cavitation was diminished. At low flow rate, two types of alternate blade cavitation were found as predicted theoretically on 4-bladed inducer with smaller uneven blade length. One of them is with longer cavities on longer blades, and the other is with longer cavities on shorter blades. Switch was observed in these alternate blade cavitation patterns depending whether the cavitation number was increased or decreased. For an inducer with larger amount of cutback, the rotating cavitation and cavitation surge were almost suppressed as expected for a wide range of flow rate and cavitation number, although the cavitation performance was deteriorated. However, we should note that an asymmetric cavitation pattern occurs more easily in inducers with alternate leading edge cutback, and that the unevenness due to the cutback causes uneven blade stress.Keywords
This publication has 7 references indexed in Scilit:
- Theoretical Analysis of Cavitation in Inducers With Unequal Blades With Alternate Leading Edge Cutback: Part II—Effects of the Amount of CutbackJournal of Fluids Engineering, 2000
- Analysis of Rotating Cavitation in a Finite Pitch Cascade Using a Closed Cavity Model and a Singularity MethodJournal of Fluids Engineering, 1999
- A Theoretical Analysis of Alternate Blade Cavitation in InducersJournal of Fluids Engineering, 1999
- Alternate Blade Cavitation on Inducer.JSME International Journal Series B, 1998
- Observations of Oscillating Cavitation of an InducerJournal of Fluids Engineering, 1997
- Hydraulic and mechanical performance of LE-7 LOX pump inducerJournal of Propulsion and Power, 1993
- A Theoretical Analysis of Rotating Cavitation in InducersJournal of Fluids Engineering, 1993