Experimentally Measured Effectiveness of Different Shroud Swirl Brake Profiles in a Centrifugal Compressor

As centrifugal compressors are pushed to operate at higher pressures and higher power levels, destabilizing gas forces often increase the challenge of designing a stable rotordynamic system. While technical innovations like damper seals, swirl brakes, and damper bearings that help stabilize compressors are numerous, predicting the impact that these improvements will have on a specific system is somewhat of an art form. To this end, researchers are constantly improving the depth of knowledge on these features so that the impact of these improvements is well defined. In the current work, the authors experimentally measured the impact of different swirl brake/vane concepts on the flow characteristics of a centrifugal compressor shroud cavity. The eye seal configuration studied here is a tooth on rotor labyrinth eye seal. The different shroud swirl vane geometries considered consist of various castellated features, each having the intent to reduce swirl velocity in the shroud cavity prior to entering the seal. The purpose of the testing was to determine whether a significant reduction in swirl velocity entering or exiting the seal could be measured with the different antiswirl vane profiles over a conventional shroud cavity that was tested with the same setup. The metrics that determine the effectiveness of the swirl brake were based on upstream and downstream measurements of swirl velocity using pitot-probes at different depths in the shroud cavity, and measurements of seal exit angle and velocity using a traversing cobra-probe. The test data presented herein show definitively that the different swirl brake designs, including a slotted seal, a long vane, and a short vane, have a major impact on swirl velocities relative to the conventional shroud design. The most effective at reducing swirl entering/leaving the seal is the slotted seal, while the concepts employing shroud vanes were more effective at reducing swirl in the shroud cavity.