Analysis of the influence of defects in gas turbine blade blanks on their acoustic characteristics

The widespread use of such power plants as gas turbine plants (GTP) imposes additional requirements to further improve their reliability. One of the main elements of a GTP is a rotor blade, which operates under high temperature and pressure conditions; special attention to the blades’ quality must be paid at the production stage, because timely detection of the defect will help avoiding emergency situations. The article discusses the issue of monitoring the technical condition of the rotor blade by the acoustic method. The results of field studies with a description of the measuring and diagnostic installation and the measurement procedure are presented. The objective comparison functions that most effectively reveal a crack in the leading edge of the airfoil of the rotor blade blanks are determined. The application of this method allows determining other characteristic defects of the blanks of GTP blades.