2/15/13 Axial Compressors

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Most modern passenger and military aircraft are powered by gas turbine engines, which are also called jet engines. There
are several different types of jet engines, but all jet engines have some parts in common. All jet engines have a compressor
to increase the pressure of the incoming air before it enters the burner. Compressor performance has a large influence on
total engine performance.

There are two main types of compressors used in modern jet engines; axial compressors are discussed on this slide, and
centrifugal compressors are discussed on another slide. In the axial compressor, the air flows parallel to the axis of rotation.
The compressor is composed of several rows of airfoil cascades. Some of the rows, called rotors, are connected to the
central shaft and rotate at high speed. Other rows, called stators, are fixed and do not rotate. The job of the stators is to
increase pressure and keep the flow from spiraling around the axis by bringing the flow back parallel to the axis. In the figure
on the right, we see a picture of the rotors of an axial compressor. The stators of this compressor are connected to the
outer casing, which has been removed and is not shown. At the upper left is a picture of a single rotor stage for a different
compressor so that you can see how the individual blades are shaped and aligned. At the bottom of the figure is a computer
generated figure of an entire axial compressor with both rotors and stators. The compressor is attached to a shaft which is
connected to the power turbine on the right end of the blue shaft. Here is an animated version of the axial compressor:

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2/15/13 Axial Compressors

How does an axial compressor work? The details are quite complex because the blade geometries and the resulting flows
are three dimensional, unsteady, and can have important viscous and compressibility effects. Each blade on a rotor or
stator produces a pressure variation much like the airfoil of a spinning propeller. But unlike a propeller blade, the blades of
an axial compressor are close to one another, which seriously alters the flow around each blade. Compressor blades
continuously pass through the wakes of upstream blades that introduce unsteady flow variations. Compressor designers
must rely on wind tunnel testing and sophisticated computational models to determine the performance of an axial
compressor. The performance is characterized by the pressure ratio across the compressor CPR, the rotational speed of
the shaft necessary to produce the pressure increase, and an efficiency factor that indicates how much additional work is
required relative to an ideal compressor. There are additional important compressor topics, like stall and surge, that will be
added to these pages in the future.

Activities:

Guided Tours

Parts of a Jet Engine:

Compressor:
Turbofans:

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