# Theoretical Analysis of Thermodynamic Effect of Cavitation in Cryogenic Inducer Using Singularity Method

Authors: S. Watanabe; A. Furukawa; Y. Yoshida
Journal: International Journal of Rotating Machinery
 (2008)

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## Abstract

Vapor production in cavitation extracts the latent heat of
evaporation from the surrounding liquid, which decreases the local temperature, and
hence the local vapor pressure in the vicinity of cavity. This is called thermodynamic/thermal
effect of cavitation and leads to the good suction performance of cryogenic turbopumps.
We have already established the simple analysis of partially cavitating flow with the
thermodynamic effect, where the latent heat extraction and the heat transfer between
the cavity and the ambient fluid are taken into account. In the present study, we carry
out the analysis for cavitating inducer and compare it with the experimental data available
from literatures using Freon R-114 and liquid nitrogen. It is found that the present analysis
can simulate fairly well the thermodynamic effect of cavitation and some modification of the
analysis considering the real fluid properties, that is, saturation characteristic, is favorable for
more qualitative agreement.


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## Body

## 1. Introduction

Vapor production in cavitation extracts the latent
heat of evaporation from the surrounding liquid, which decreases the local
temperature, and hence the local vapor pressure in the vicinity of cavity. This
is called a thermodynamic/thermal effect of cavitation. The thermodynamic
effect of cavitation could be ignored for usual applications especially with
water at ambient temperature, but is much more important for cryogenic fluids
such as liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen. For example, the suction performance
of turbopump inducer for liquid propellant rocket engine is much better if
operated with cryogenic fluids than cold water (Yoshida et al. [1]); the development of cavity is suppressed because of local vapor pressure
depression due to the thermodynamic effect of cavitation. Recently, Franc et al.
[2] have visually observed the thermodynamic effect in a turbopump
inducer by using Freon R-114 as a working fluid, and succeeded in evaluating
the effective temperature depression and Stepanoff’s B-factor (Stepanoff [3]) through the comparison of cold water
and R-114. Yoshida et al. [1] have measured the casing wall pressure distribution
in an inducer with liquid nitrogen, and estimated the cavity volume from the
low pressure region in the casing wall pressure distribution. Then, they have
evaluated the effective temperature depression and B-factor by comparing the
cavitation number which gives the same cavity length between cold water and
liquid nitrogen.Many theoretical/numerical studies have been done to clarify
the thermodynamic effect of cavitation. Focusing on the recent studies, Kato [4] proposed a simple model expressing
the heat flow around the sheet cavity by one-dimensional partial differential
equation of unsteady heat conduction, and Tokumasu et al. [5] investigated the thermodynamic
effect on closed sheet cavities by combining RANS simulation with Kato’s model. Tani and Nagashima [6] simulated the cavitating flow around
a hydrofoil with cryogenic fluids by the bubbly flow model based on the
Rayleigh Plesset equation. Hosangadi et al. [7] have developed the compressible two-phase flow analysis considering the
evaporation and the condensation processes, and compared their results with
experiments using various test models and several cryogens (Hord [8]).We have developed a simple analysis of unsteady
cavitating flow combining a free streamline theory and a singularity method,
and succeeded in simulating the cavitation instabilities of hydrofoil (Watanabe
et al. [9]) as well as those of cascade such as rotating
cavitation and cavitation surge (Watanabe et al. [10]). More recently, we have constructed
an analytical
method of the thermodynamic effect on steady, partially cavitating flow (Watanabe
et al. [11]). In this
work, a singularity analysis is combined with a heat transfer model proposed by
Kato [4] and described above.In the present study, we apply our analysis for a cavitating flow
of two different working fluids, Freon R-114 and liquid nitrogen, in a cascade and compare the results
with the experimental ones in a turbopump inducer reported by Franc
et al. [2] and Yoshida et al. [1]. Some modification of the analysis is
described, which seems to be necessary to obtain more qualitative agreement
with the experiments using cryogenic fluids.


## 2. Fundamental Flow Field

We consider a flat plate cascade with the chordlengthC, spacing h, the stagger angle β, and the number of blade N as shown in Figure 1. We assume that the
flow far upstream is uniform with the magnitude U and the angle of attack α. Each blade is represented by bound vortex
distributions γn(ξ)[n=0,1,…,N−1], and the cavity with length ln which develops on the
suction surface of each
blade is represented by source distributions qn(ξ)[n=0,1,…,N−1]. Then the complex conjugate
velocity is expressed by the following equation:
(1)w(z)=u−iv=Ue−iα+12π∑n=0N−1[∫0lnqn(ξ)⋅{fn(z,ξ)+πNheiβ}dξ+i∫0lnγ1n(ξ)⋅{fn(z,ξ)+πNheiβ}dξ+i∫lnCγ2n(ξ)⋅{fn(z,ξ)+πNheiβ}dξ],(2)fn(z,ξ)=πNhe−i(π/2−β)⋅cot⁡[πNh(z−ξ)e−i(π/2−β)−nπN].Figure 1
Model for present analysis.We divide the velocity components into the uniform
velocityU and the deviation (us,vs), that is,
(3)u=U+us,v=Uα+vs.In the present study, we linearize the equations under
the assumptions of the small angle of attackα≪1 and the small velocity deviations |us|,|vs|≪U.


## 3. Boundary and Complementary Conditions

We assume that the cavity is sufficiently thin so
that all boundary conditions are applied on the blade suction surface. In the
following sections, boundary and complementary conditions applied are described
fornth blade.


### 3.1. Boundary Condition on Cavity Surface

We assume that the pressure on the
cavity surface is equal to the vapor pressure, which is locally different due
to the temperature depression around the cavity surface under the presence of
the thermodynamic effect of cavitation. Integrating the linearized momentum
equation in thex-direction, we
obtain the following equation:
(4)ucsn(x)Uα=σn(x)2α,where ucsn(x) denotes the velocity on the cavity surface
at x. The local cavitation number σn(x) has been defined using the local
vapor pressure pvn(x),
(5)σn(x)=p∞−pvn(x)ρLU2/2, where p∞ denotes the pressure far
upstream and ρL denotes the
density of liquid phase.


### 3.2. Boundary Condition on Wetted Surface

We employ the
following flow tangency condition on the wetted blade surfaces:(6)Imag[w{nhe−i(π/2−β)+x−0i}]=0(0<x<ln),Imag[w{nhe−i(π/2−β)+x±0i}]=0(ln<x<C).


### 3.3. Kutta’s Condition

We assume that
the pressure difference across the blade vanishes at the trailing edge. This
condition is simply expressed as follows:(7)γ2n(ln)=0.


### 3.4. Cavity Closure Condition

We employ the closed cavity model for its
simplicity. The cavity thicknessηn can be obtained by integrating the following kinematic boundary condition
on the cavity surface:
(8)Udηndx=qn(x).
Imposing the zero cavity thickness at the trailing edge of cavity, we
obtain the following cavity closure condition:
(9)ηn(ln)=1U∫0lnqn(ξ)dξ=0.


## 3.1. Boundary Condition on Cavity Surface

We assume that the pressure on the
cavity surface is equal to the vapor pressure, which is locally different due
to the temperature depression around the cavity surface under the presence of
the thermodynamic effect of cavitation. Integrating the linearized momentum
equation in thex-direction, we
obtain the following equation:
(4)ucsn(x)Uα=σn(x)2α,where ucsn(x) denotes the velocity on the cavity surface
at x. The local cavitation number σn(x) has been defined using the local
vapor pressure pvn(x),
(5)σn(x)=p∞−pvn(x)ρLU2/2, where p∞ denotes the pressure far
upstream and ρL denotes the
density of liquid phase.


## 3.2. Boundary Condition on Wetted Surface

We employ the
following flow tangency condition on the wetted blade surfaces:(6)Imag[w{nhe−i(π/2−β)+x−0i}]=0(0<x<ln),Imag[w{nhe−i(π/2−β)+x±0i}]=0(ln<x<C).


## 3.3. Kutta’s Condition

We assume that
the pressure difference across the blade vanishes at the trailing edge. This
condition is simply expressed as follows:(7)γ2n(ln)=0.


## 3.4. Cavity Closure Condition

We employ the closed cavity model for its
simplicity. The cavity thicknessηn can be obtained by integrating the following kinematic boundary condition
on the cavity surface:
(8)Udηndx=qn(x).
Imposing the zero cavity thickness at the trailing edge of cavity, we
obtain the following cavity closure condition:
(9)ηn(ln)=1U∫0lnqn(ξ)dξ=0.


## 4. Modeling of Thermodynamic Effect

In the previous
section, we have described about the kinematic and dynamic boundary conditions,
assuming that the local vapor pressure distribution along the cavity surface is
known. To close the problem, we have to obtain the local vapor pressure distribution.
Here, we model the thermodynamic effect of cavitation, using the following heat
conduction model for the liquid flow around the cavity and the evaporation
model expressing the heat flux across the cavity surface due to evaporation.


### 4.1. Heat Conduction Model

We assume that
the heat conduction in the main flow direction (x) is negligibly small, compared to that in the direction (y) normal to the cavity surface. The
temperature increase (decrease) due to the formation of thin cavity ΔTn should satisfy the following
linearized energy equation for inviscid flow:
(10)∂ΔTn∂t+U∂ΔTn∂x=εa∂2ΔTn∂y2, where a denotes a thermal
diffusivity. Kato’s turbulent diffusivity factor ε (Kato [4]) has been employed to take account
of the enhancement of thermal diffusion due to the turbulent flow around the
cavity.Temperature
differenceΔTn between far upstream and the cavity surface is expressed as follows:
(11)ΔTn=Tn(x,0)−T∞=αT∞CTn(x,0),
where we have
assumed that the temperature difference ΔTn is sufficiently small and changes
linearly with the change of the incidence α.
Substituting the above equation into (10), we obtain
the following equation:
(12)U∂CTn∂x=εa∂2CTn∂y2.
We can find that this equation is equivalent to one-dimensional partial
differential equation of unsteady heat conduction. Assuming no temperature
depression at the leading edge of cavity (x=0),
we can analytically integrate the above equation using the normalized
temperature increase along the cavity surface Cθn(x):(13)CTn(x,y)=y2πKP∫0xCθn(ξ)exp⁡(−y2/4KP(x−ξ))(x−ξ)3/2dξ, where KP is defined
here as KP=εa/U. Then,
the temperature gradient normal to the cavity surface is derived as
(14)lim⁡y→0∂CTn(x,y)∂y=−1πKP∫0xdCθn(ξ)dξ1(x−ξ)1/2dξ.


### 4.2. Evaporation Model

We assume that
the velocity inside the cavity is uniform in they-direction which equals to the liquid velocity U+ucsn on the cavity surface as shown in Figure 2. Considering the continuity relation
in the small control volume inside the cavity, we obtain the following equation
using the local evaporation velocity Vn of vapor phase:
(15)Vndx=(U+ucsn′′)ηn′′−(U+ucsn′)ηn′=Udηn.Figure 2
Control volume for continuity equation.From this equation, we can calculate the local
evaporation velocityVn. However,
it is experimentally observed that, in general cases, the cavitation bubbles do
not collapse completely at the trailing edge and some part of the cavity is
flown away as a form of the cloud cavity shedding. The magnitude of the cloud
cavity shedding becomes larger as the cavity becomes longer. Then, in order to
take account of the effect of the cloud cavity shedding, we modify the evaporation velocity by
multiplying the cavity length (ln/C), which has been known to give a good
approximation in our previous study (Watanabe et al. [11]). Then, the heat flux due to the
local latent heat of evaporation on the cavity surface can be expressed as
follows:
(16)qTn=−ρVLlnCVn=−ρVLlnCUdηndx=−ρVLlnCqn,
where L denotes the latent heat
of evaporation and ρV is the density of vapor phase. By using the expression Cqn=qn/Uα, which will be introduced in the next section, we obtain
(17)qTn=−LρVlnCUαCqn.
We can also
calculate the local heat flux from the temperature
gradient (14) as
(18)qTn=−ελ∂Tn∂y|y=0=ελαT∞πKP∫0xdCθn(ξ)dξ1(x−ξ)1/2dξ,
where λ denotes the thermal conductivity for
the liquid phase. By equating this equation with (17), we obtain
the following one:
(19)∫0xdCθn(ξ)/dξ(x−ξ)1/2dξ=−(lnC)LCPT∞(ρVρL)CUaπCεCqn,
where CP denotes the specific heat of liquid phase. As we can see from (17), the heat
flux across the cavity surface is directly related to the source term Cqn=qn/Uα; Cqn>0
corresponds to the evaporation with the heat absorption, and Cqn<0 corresponds to the
condensation with the heat generation. Then, we have heat absorption from the
surrounding liquid near the leading edge and heat generation near the trailing
edge of the cavity. In the present closed cavity model, the cavity terminates
with a rapid condensation near the trailing edge, but it is again reasonable to
imagine that some portion of vapor flows away forming a cloud cavitation and
condensates far downstream of the cascade. Then, as we have done in our previous
study (Watanabe et al. [11]), we hereafter take account only of the heat flux
due to evaporation and neglect that due to condensation near the trailing edge
of cavity.


### 4.3. Vapor Pressure

We have assumed
that the pressure on the cavity surface is equal to the vapor pressure, which is
locally different due to the temperature depression around the cavity surface
under the presence of the thermodynamic effect of cavitation. In order to
relate the vapor pressurePVn(x) with the temperature Tn(x), we apply the Clapeyron-Clausius equation as follows:
(20)PVn(x)−PV∞=dPVdT(Tn(x,0)−T∞)=LT∞ρVρLρL−ρV(Tn(x,0)−T∞)=ρVLαCTn(x,0),
where we have assumed that ρV≪ρL. Then the cavitation number based on the local vapor
pressure σn(x) defined
in (5) can be expressed as follows:
(21)σn(x)2α=σ2α−(ρVρL)LU2CTn(x,0),
where σ=2(P∞−Pv∞)/ρLU2 is a usual cavitation number based on the
far upstream values.


## 4.1. Heat Conduction Model

We assume that
the heat conduction in the main flow direction (x) is negligibly small, compared to that in the direction (y) normal to the cavity surface. The
temperature increase (decrease) due to the formation of thin cavity ΔTn should satisfy the following
linearized energy equation for inviscid flow:
(10)∂ΔTn∂t+U∂ΔTn∂x=εa∂2ΔTn∂y2, where a denotes a thermal
diffusivity. Kato’s turbulent diffusivity factor ε (Kato [4]) has been employed to take account
of the enhancement of thermal diffusion due to the turbulent flow around the
cavity.Temperature
differenceΔTn between far upstream and the cavity surface is expressed as follows:
(11)ΔTn=Tn(x,0)−T∞=αT∞CTn(x,0),
where we have
assumed that the temperature difference ΔTn is sufficiently small and changes
linearly with the change of the incidence α.
Substituting the above equation into (10), we obtain
the following equation:
(12)U∂CTn∂x=εa∂2CTn∂y2.
We can find that this equation is equivalent to one-dimensional partial
differential equation of unsteady heat conduction. Assuming no temperature
depression at the leading edge of cavity (x=0),
we can analytically integrate the above equation using the normalized
temperature increase along the cavity surface Cθn(x):(13)CTn(x,y)=y2πKP∫0xCθn(ξ)exp⁡(−y2/4KP(x−ξ))(x−ξ)3/2dξ, where KP is defined
here as KP=εa/U. Then,
the temperature gradient normal to the cavity surface is derived as
(14)lim⁡y→0∂CTn(x,y)∂y=−1πKP∫0xdCθn(ξ)dξ1(x−ξ)1/2dξ.


## 4.2. Evaporation Model

We assume that
the velocity inside the cavity is uniform in they-direction which equals to the liquid velocity U+ucsn on the cavity surface as shown in Figure 2. Considering the continuity relation
in the small control volume inside the cavity, we obtain the following equation
using the local evaporation velocity Vn of vapor phase:
(15)Vndx=(U+ucsn′′)ηn′′−(U+ucsn′)ηn′=Udηn.Figure 2
Control volume for continuity equation.From this equation, we can calculate the local
evaporation velocityVn. However,
it is experimentally observed that, in general cases, the cavitation bubbles do
not collapse completely at the trailing edge and some part of the cavity is
flown away as a form of the cloud cavity shedding. The magnitude of the cloud
cavity shedding becomes larger as the cavity becomes longer. Then, in order to
take account of the effect of the cloud cavity shedding, we modify the evaporation velocity by
multiplying the cavity length (ln/C), which has been known to give a good
approximation in our previous study (Watanabe et al. [11]). Then, the heat flux due to the
local latent heat of evaporation on the cavity surface can be expressed as
follows:
(16)qTn=−ρVLlnCVn=−ρVLlnCUdηndx=−ρVLlnCqn,
where L denotes the latent heat
of evaporation and ρV is the density of vapor phase. By using the expression Cqn=qn/Uα, which will be introduced in the next section, we obtain
(17)qTn=−LρVlnCUαCqn.
We can also
calculate the local heat flux from the temperature
gradient (14) as
(18)qTn=−ελ∂Tn∂y|y=0=ελαT∞πKP∫0xdCθn(ξ)dξ1(x−ξ)1/2dξ,
where λ denotes the thermal conductivity for
the liquid phase. By equating this equation with (17), we obtain
the following one:
(19)∫0xdCθn(ξ)/dξ(x−ξ)1/2dξ=−(lnC)LCPT∞(ρVρL)CUaπCεCqn,
where CP denotes the specific heat of liquid phase. As we can see from (17), the heat
flux across the cavity surface is directly related to the source term Cqn=qn/Uα; Cqn>0
corresponds to the evaporation with the heat absorption, and Cqn<0 corresponds to the
condensation with the heat generation. Then, we have heat absorption from the
surrounding liquid near the leading edge and heat generation near the trailing
edge of the cavity. In the present closed cavity model, the cavity terminates
with a rapid condensation near the trailing edge, but it is again reasonable to
imagine that some portion of vapor flows away forming a cloud cavitation and
condensates far downstream of the cascade. Then, as we have done in our previous
study (Watanabe et al. [11]), we hereafter take account only of the heat flux
due to evaporation and neglect that due to condensation near the trailing edge
of cavity.


## 4.3. Vapor Pressure

We have assumed
that the pressure on the cavity surface is equal to the vapor pressure, which is
locally different due to the temperature depression around the cavity surface
under the presence of the thermodynamic effect of cavitation. In order to
relate the vapor pressurePVn(x) with the temperature Tn(x), we apply the Clapeyron-Clausius equation as follows:
(20)PVn(x)−PV∞=dPVdT(Tn(x,0)−T∞)=LT∞ρVρLρL−ρV(Tn(x,0)−T∞)=ρVLαCTn(x,0),
where we have assumed that ρV≪ρL. Then the cavitation number based on the local vapor
pressure σn(x) defined
in (5) can be expressed as follows:
(21)σn(x)2α=σ2α−(ρVρL)LU2CTn(x,0),
where σ=2(P∞−Pv∞)/ρLU2 is a usual cavitation number based on the
far upstream values.


## 5. Analytical Method

Discretization
of singularities distributed along the blades and cavities are made in the same
manner as Horiguchi et al. [12], where nodes are distributed more densely near
the leading and trailing edges of the blades and cavities. The temperatures
along the cavity surface are evaluated at the midpoints between each node as
well as at the leading edge. The control points, where boundary conditions are
applied, are also placed at the midpoints between each node.We define the
normalized strength of singularities as follows:(22)Cqn(ξ)=qn(ξ)Uα,Cγ1n(ξ)=γ1n(ξ)Uα,Cγ2n(ξ)=γ2n(ξ)Uα.Discretizing
the boundary and complementary conditions (4)–(9), (19), (21),
we obtain the following set of linear equations:
(23)[A(ln)]{Q}={B}{Q}={Cqn(ξ),…,Cγ1n(ξ),…,Cγ2n(ξ),…,Cθn(ξ),…,σ2α}T, where A(ln) and B are a coefficient matrix and a constant vector, respectively.
From this equation, we can obtain the cavity length ln as well as the other unknowns for the given value of σ/2α.


## 6. Results and Discussions

The present
analysis treats the cavity on each blade individually, so that it can be
applied to the analysis of cavitating flow with different cavity shapes for
each blade such as alternate blade cavitation, which is known to occur for
inducers with even blade count (Horiguchi et al. [12]). However, in the present
paper, we concentrate on the cavitating flow with identical cavities for each
blade.


### 6.1. For Freon R-114

Figure3 shows Franc's
experimental results by using Freon R-114 and cold water as working fluids
(Franc et al. [2]). As we can see from the plot of the cavity length against
cavitation number (parameter) in Figure 3(a), the development of the cavity is
suppressed for R114 with the higher temperature compared with those for cold
water and R114 with the lower temperature due to the thermodynamic effect of
cavitation. Franc et al. have estimated the effective temperature depression
due to the thermodynamic effect of cavitation by using the following equation:
(24)12ρLU2(σc−σ)=dPdTΔT, where σc denotes the cavitation number without the
thermodynamic effect. In cold water, the thermodynamic effect can usually be
negligible, then the cavitation number in cold water is herein used for σc. Under the assumption that the flow around the cavity
for the given cavity length is similar even in the different working fluids, we
can estimate the effective temperature depression via (24) by comparing the
cavitation number with the same cavity length between cold water and the other
fluid. We can see from Figure 3(b) that the temperature depression is more
significant in the higher temperature cases with the higher rotational speed.
The temperature depression becomes larger as the cavity becomes longer, which
is simply because the amount of the evaporation is larger for longer
cavitation.Experimental results in the case of R-114 and cold water (Franc et al. [2]).
(a)
Cavity length(b)
Temperature depressionFigure4 shows the present analytical result for the R-114 and cold water
cases. The analysis has been done for the cascade with the stagger angle of
78.8°, the solidity of 2.0, and the dimensional chord
length is 0.203 mm as a numerical configuration. The incidence angle and the
main flow velocity are chosen as α = 4.32° and U = 34.0 m/s
with the rotational speed of 5000 min−1. The turbulence diffusion
factor ε is unknown but
is set to be 1000, which gives comparable figures with the experimental ones.
We can see from the comparisons between Figures 3 and 4 that the present
analysis can simulate the phenomena fairly well; the thermodynamic effect is
more apparent with the larger temperature depression for the higher temperature
cases.Numerical results in the case of R-114 and cold water.
(a)
Cavity length(b)
Temperature depression


### 6.2. For Liquid Nitrogen

Figure5 shows Yoshida's experimental results by using liquid nitrogen
(LN2) with 80 K and cold water as a working fluid (Yoshida et al. [1]). In
their experiments, they succeeded in measuring the cavity length indirectly
from the pressure measurement, which is plotted in Figure 5(a). They also
estimated the effective temperature depression using Franc's method with (24),
which is plotted in Figure 5(b). As we can see from Figure 5(a), the
development of the cavity is suppressed in the LN2 cases due to the
thermodynamic effect of cavitation, which is similar to the cases with R-114 (Figure
3). In Figure 5(b), the effective temperature depression is plotted for longer
cavitation in Yoshida's LN2 experiment than that in Franc's R-114 experiment,
and we can see from this figure that the larger the cavity length becomes, the
more the temperature depression also increases, which is similar to the case
with R-114. However, when the cavity trailing edge reaches the throat section
of the inducer (the cavity length equals to the pitch h), the temperature depression decreases slightly, which is
probably due to the interaction between the cavity trailing edge and the flow
around the leading edge of the adjacent blade. Further increase of the cavity
length leads to the increase of the temperature depression again, whereas the
temperature depression is being saturated when the cavity trailing edge
approaches the trailing edge of the inducer blade. At that moment, the
effective temperature depression is about 14 K. Because the temperature range
in the liquid nitrogen is between 63 K (triple point) and 126 K (critical
point) and the test temperature is 80 K, the value of 14 K is supposed to be
almost the maximum possible temperature depression (80−63 = 17 K), which probably
explains why the temperature depression seems to be limited in Figure 5(b).Experimental results in the case of LN2 and cold water (Yoshida et al. [1]).
(a)
Cavity length(b)
Temperature depressionFigure6 shows the present analytical result for the LN2 with 76 K and 80 K
and cold water cases. The analysis has been done for the cascade with the
stagger angle of 75°, the solidity of 2.0. The incidence angle is set to
be 5° and the turbulence diffusion factor ε is again set to
be 1000. We can see from the comparisons between Figures 5 and 6 that the
present analysis can simulate the phenomenon fairly well except that the
effective temperature depression continues to increase even when the cavity
trailing edge reaches the trailing edge of the blade in our analysis. This is
probably because we have employed the Clapeyron-Clausius equation to estimate
the vapor pressure for the local temperature, where the vapor pressure is
assumed to change linearly with the change in the temperature; for the liquid
nitrogen, the temperature range is narrow. The linear assumption is probably
inappropriate in such cases.Numerical results in the case of LN2 and cold water.
(a)
Cavity length(b)
Temperature depressionFigure7 shows
the saturation curve in the nitrogen, from which we can find the large
deviation of the Clapeyron-Clausius equation from the real saturation curve.
Then, we made the analysis using the saturation curve in Figure 7 instead of
(20). The results are shown in Figure 8. We can see the qualitatively good
agreement between present analysis and the experiments shown in Figure 5. Then,
in the cases with the fluids with narrower liquid temperature range and/or the
cases where the large temperature depression is expected, the assumption of
Clapeyron-Clausius equation as used in the estimate of B-factor seems to be insufficient
to predict the thermodynamic effect of cavitation; at least, the real saturation
curve should be taken into account for more qualitative/quantitative analysis
of the thermodynamic effect of cavitation.Figure 7
Saturation curve for nitrogen.Modified results in the case of LN2 and cold water.
(a)
Cavity length(b)
Temperature depression


## 6.1. For Freon R-114

Figure3 shows Franc's
experimental results by using Freon R-114 and cold water as working fluids
(Franc et al. [2]). As we can see from the plot of the cavity length against
cavitation number (parameter) in Figure 3(a), the development of the cavity is
suppressed for R114 with the higher temperature compared with those for cold
water and R114 with the lower temperature due to the thermodynamic effect of
cavitation. Franc et al. have estimated the effective temperature depression
due to the thermodynamic effect of cavitation by using the following equation:
(24)12ρLU2(σc−σ)=dPdTΔT, where σc denotes the cavitation number without the
thermodynamic effect. In cold water, the thermodynamic effect can usually be
negligible, then the cavitation number in cold water is herein used for σc. Under the assumption that the flow around the cavity
for the given cavity length is similar even in the different working fluids, we
can estimate the effective temperature depression via (24) by comparing the
cavitation number with the same cavity length between cold water and the other
fluid. We can see from Figure 3(b) that the temperature depression is more
significant in the higher temperature cases with the higher rotational speed.
The temperature depression becomes larger as the cavity becomes longer, which
is simply because the amount of the evaporation is larger for longer
cavitation.Experimental results in the case of R-114 and cold water (Franc et al. [2]).
(a)
Cavity length(b)
Temperature depressionFigure4 shows the present analytical result for the R-114 and cold water
cases. The analysis has been done for the cascade with the stagger angle of
78.8°, the solidity of 2.0, and the dimensional chord
length is 0.203 mm as a numerical configuration. The incidence angle and the
main flow velocity are chosen as α = 4.32° and U = 34.0 m/s
with the rotational speed of 5000 min−1. The turbulence diffusion
factor ε is unknown but
is set to be 1000, which gives comparable figures with the experimental ones.
We can see from the comparisons between Figures 3 and 4 that the present
analysis can simulate the phenomena fairly well; the thermodynamic effect is
more apparent with the larger temperature depression for the higher temperature
cases.Numerical results in the case of R-114 and cold water.
(a)
Cavity length(b)
Temperature depression


## 6.2. For Liquid Nitrogen

Figure5 shows Yoshida's experimental results by using liquid nitrogen
(LN2) with 80 K and cold water as a working fluid (Yoshida et al. [1]). In
their experiments, they succeeded in measuring the cavity length indirectly
from the pressure measurement, which is plotted in Figure 5(a). They also
estimated the effective temperature depression using Franc's method with (24),
which is plotted in Figure 5(b). As we can see from Figure 5(a), the
development of the cavity is suppressed in the LN2 cases due to the
thermodynamic effect of cavitation, which is similar to the cases with R-114 (Figure
3). In Figure 5(b), the effective temperature depression is plotted for longer
cavitation in Yoshida's LN2 experiment than that in Franc's R-114 experiment,
and we can see from this figure that the larger the cavity length becomes, the
more the temperature depression also increases, which is similar to the case
with R-114. However, when the cavity trailing edge reaches the throat section
of the inducer (the cavity length equals to the pitch h), the temperature depression decreases slightly, which is
probably due to the interaction between the cavity trailing edge and the flow
around the leading edge of the adjacent blade. Further increase of the cavity
length leads to the increase of the temperature depression again, whereas the
temperature depression is being saturated when the cavity trailing edge
approaches the trailing edge of the inducer blade. At that moment, the
effective temperature depression is about 14 K. Because the temperature range
in the liquid nitrogen is between 63 K (triple point) and 126 K (critical
point) and the test temperature is 80 K, the value of 14 K is supposed to be
almost the maximum possible temperature depression (80−63 = 17 K), which probably
explains why the temperature depression seems to be limited in Figure 5(b).Experimental results in the case of LN2 and cold water (Yoshida et al. [1]).
(a)
Cavity length(b)
Temperature depressionFigure6 shows the present analytical result for the LN2 with 76 K and 80 K
and cold water cases. The analysis has been done for the cascade with the
stagger angle of 75°, the solidity of 2.0. The incidence angle is set to
be 5° and the turbulence diffusion factor ε is again set to
be 1000. We can see from the comparisons between Figures 5 and 6 that the
present analysis can simulate the phenomenon fairly well except that the
effective temperature depression continues to increase even when the cavity
trailing edge reaches the trailing edge of the blade in our analysis. This is
probably because we have employed the Clapeyron-Clausius equation to estimate
the vapor pressure for the local temperature, where the vapor pressure is
assumed to change linearly with the change in the temperature; for the liquid
nitrogen, the temperature range is narrow. The linear assumption is probably
inappropriate in such cases.Numerical results in the case of LN2 and cold water.
(a)
Cavity length(b)
Temperature depressionFigure7 shows
the saturation curve in the nitrogen, from which we can find the large
deviation of the Clapeyron-Clausius equation from the real saturation curve.
Then, we made the analysis using the saturation curve in Figure 7 instead of
(20). The results are shown in Figure 8. We can see the qualitatively good
agreement between present analysis and the experiments shown in Figure 5. Then,
in the cases with the fluids with narrower liquid temperature range and/or the
cases where the large temperature depression is expected, the assumption of
Clapeyron-Clausius equation as used in the estimate of B-factor seems to be insufficient
to predict the thermodynamic effect of cavitation; at least, the real saturation
curve should be taken into account for more qualitative/quantitative analysis
of the thermodynamic effect of cavitation.Figure 7
Saturation curve for nitrogen.Modified results in the case of LN2 and cold water.
(a)
Cavity length(b)
Temperature depression


## 7. Conclusions

In the present
study,  we have carried out the singularity analysis considering the
thermodynamic effect of cavitation for the cavitating cascade in Freon R-114
and liquid nitrogen. Through the detailed comparisons with the existing experiments
done by Franc et al. [2] and Yoshida et al. [1], it is found that the present
analysis can qualitatively well reproduce the thermodynamic effect of
cavitation. The major conclusions obtained here are summarized as follows.(1)
The development of the cavity is suppressed
due to the thermodynamic effect of cavitation. This effect is more significant
for higher temperature.(2)
The thermodynamic effect becomes more
apparent, and then the temperature depression becomes larger as the cavity
becomes longer, because the larger amount of latent heat of evaporation is
needed.(3)
When the cavity trailing edge reaches the
throat section of the inducer, the temperature depression slightly decreases.
This is probably due to the interaction between the cavity trailing edge and
the flow around the leading edge of the adjacent blade.(4)
In the cases with the fluids with
narrower liquid temperature range and/or the cases where the large temperature
depression is expected, the temperature depression might be limited by the
triple point. To simulate this effect, the real saturation curve should be at
least taken into account.The present
study analytically models the thermodynamic effect of cavitation,  whereas some
parts such as the determination of the turbulence diffusion factorε are still
difficult. The quantitative estimates of them are crucial to develop this
analysis for more practical applications. Further experimental data with
cryogenic fluids and sophistication of the model are needed for this purpose. Moreover, the real flow in the cavitating inducer is
so complicated with the tip leakage and the back flow cavitations in addition
to the blade surface cavitation treated here. The analysis for the other forms
of cavitation still remains for future study.



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*Source: 125678-2008-09-04.xml*