Patent ID: 7753652

Claim:
An array of flow directing elements for use in a turbomachine comprising: a plurality of flow directing elements mounted on a rotor disk, each said flow directing element including a radially extending span dimension and a chord dimension extending substantially perpendicular to said span dimension; said plurality of flow directing elements comprising first flow directing elements forming a first set of flow directing elements and second flow directing elements forming a second set of flow directing elements; said flow directing elements each comprise a leading edge and a trailing edge, and said trailing edges of said second set of flow directing elements are located at a different axial location than corresponding trailing edges of said first set of flow directing elements to define different chordal dimensions for said second set of flow directing elements; wherein an element-to-element flow field defined between successive ones of said first set of flow directing elements is interrupted by said second set of flow directing elements to form an asymmetric element-to-element flow field around said array of flow directing elements; and wherein each of two or more of said flow directing elements have one or more respective coupling components, each said one or more coupling component having opposite front and rear contact surfaces with respect to a rotational direction of said rotor disk, said one or more coupling components being arranged in such a way that coupling components of two adjacent flow directing elements are brought into contact with each other at adjacent front and rear contact surfaces during rotation.