Effect of external turbulence on the efficiency of film cooling with coolant injection into a transverse trench

Film cooling is among the basic methods used for thermal protection of blades in modern high-temperature gas turbines. Results of computer simulation of film cooling with coolant injection via a row of conventional inclined holes or a row of holes in a trench are presented in this paper. The ANSYS CFX 14 commercial software package was used for CFD-modeling. The effect is studied of the mainstream turbulence on the film cooling efficiency for the blowing ratio range between 0.6 and 2.3 and three different turbulence intensities of 1, 5, and 10%. The mainstream velocity was 150 and 400 m/s, while the temperatures of the mainstream and the injected coolant were 1100 and 500°C, respectively. It is demonstrated that, for the coolant injection via one row of trenched holes, an increase in the mainstream turbulence intensity reduces the film cooling efficiency in the entire investigated range of blowing ratios. It was revealed that freestream turbulence had varied effects on the film cooling efficiency depending on the blowing ratio and mainstream velocity in a blade channel. Thus, an increase in the mainstream turbulence intensity from 1 to 10% decreases the surface-averaged film cooling efficiency by 3–10% at a high mainstream velocity (400 m/s) in the blade channel and by 12–23% at a moderate velocity (of 150 m/s). Here, lower film cooling efficiencies correspond to higher blowing ratios. The effect of mainstream turbulence intensity on the film cooling efficiency decreases with increasing the mainstream velocity in the modeled channel for both investigated configurations.