The durability of gas turbine engines is strongly dependent on the component temperatures. For the combustor and turbine airfoils and endwalls, film cooling is used extensively to reduce component temperatures. Film cooling is a cooling method used in virtually all of today's aircraft turbine engines and in many power-generation turbine engines and yet has very difficult phenomena to predict. The interaction of jets-in-crossflow, which is representative of film cooling, results in a shear layer that leads to mixing and a decay in the cooling performance along a surface. This interaction is highly dependent on the jet-to-crossflow mass and momentum flux ratios. Film-cooling performance is difficult to predict because of the inherent complex flowfields along the airfoil component surfaces in turbine engines. Film cooling is applied to nearly all of the external surfaces associated with the airfoils that are exposed to the hot combustion gasses such as the leading edges, main bodies, blade tips, and endwalls. In a review of the literature, it was found that there are strong effects of freestream turbulence, surface curvature, and hole shape on the performance of film cooling. Film cooling is reviewed through a discussion of the analyses methodologies, a physical description, and the various influences on film-cooling performance. Dr. David Bogard is a Professor of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Texas at Austin, and holds the John E. Kasch Fellow in Engineering. He received his B.S. and M.S. degrees in mechanical engineering from Oklahoma State University, and his Ph.D. from Purdue University. He has served on the faculty at the University of Texas since 1982. Dr. Bogard has been active in gas turbine cooling research since 1986, and has published over 100 peer-reviewed papers. He was awarded the ASME Heat Transfer Committee Best Paper Award in 1990 and 2003, and is a fellow of the ASME. Dr. Karen Thole holds the William S. Cross Professorship of Mechanical Engineering at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. She received her B.S. and M.S. degrees in mechanical engineering from the University of Illinois, and a Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Austin. She spent two years as a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute for Thermal Turbomachinery at the University of Karslruhe in Germany and in 1994 she accepted a faculty position at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. In 1999, she became a faculty member in the Mechanical Engineering Department at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University where she was promoted to professor in 2003. She received the National Science Foundation CAREER Award in 1996, which was directed at developing a better understanding of gas turbine heat transfer. Dr. Thole's areas of expertise are heat transfer and fluid mechanics specializing in turbulent boundary layers, convective heat transfer, and high freestream turbulence effects. She has published more than 80 peer-reviewed papers and has advised over 30 graduate theses.

Recent technological advances in the field of additive manufacturing (AM), particularly with direct metal laser sintering (DMLS), have increased the potential for building gas turbine components with AM. Using the DMLS for turbine components broadens the design space and allows for increasingly small and complex geometries to be fabricated with little increase in time or cost. Challenges arise when attempting to evaluate the advantages of the DMLS for specific applications, particularly because of how little is known regarding the effects of surface roughness. This paper presents pressure drop and heat transfer results of flow through small, as produced channels that have been manufactured using the DMLS in an effort to better understand roughness. Ten different coupons made with the DMLS all having multiple rectangular channels were evaluated in this study. Measurements were collected at various flow conditions and reduced to a friction factor and a Nusselt number. Results showed significant augmentation of these parameters compared to smooth channels, particularly with the friction factor for minichannels with small hydraulic diameters. However, augmentation of Nusselt number did not increase proportionally with the augmentation of the friction factor.

Film cooling on airfoils is a crucial cooling method as the gas turbine industry seeks higher turbine inlet temperatures. Shaped film cooling holes are widely used in many designs given the improved performance over that of cylindrical holes. Although there have been numerous studies of shaped holes, there is no established baseline shaped hole to which new cooling hole designs can be compared. The goal of this study is to offer the community a shaped hole design, representative of proprietary and open literature holes that serves as a baseline for comparison purposes. The baseline shaped cooling hole design includes the following features: hole inclination angle of 30° with a 7° expansion in the forward and lateral directions; hole length of 6 diameters; hole exit-to-inlet area ratio of 2.5; and lateral hole spacing of 6 diameters. Adiabatic effectiveness was measured with this new shaped hole and was found to peak near a blowing ratio of 1.5 at density ratios of 1.2 and 1.5 as well as at both low and moderate freestream turbulence of 5%. Reductions in area-averaged effectiveness due to freestream turbulence at low blowing ratios were as high as 10%.

High freestream turbulence levels significantly alter the characteristics of turbulent boundary layers. Numerous studies have been conducted with freestreams having turbulence levels of 7 percent or less, but studies using turbulence levels greater than 10 percent have been essentially limited to the effects on wall shear stress and heat transfer. This paper presents measurements of the boundary layer statistics for the interaction between a turbulent boundary layer and a freestream with turbulence levels ranging from 10 to 20 percent. The boundary layer statistics reported in this paper include mean and rms velocities, velocity correlation coefficients, length scales, and power spectra. Although the freestream turbulent eddies penetrate into the boundary layer at high freestream turbulence levels, as shown through spectra and length scale measurements, the mean velocity profile still exhibits a log-linear region. Direct measurements of total shear stress (turbulent shear stress and viscous shear stress) confirm the validity of the log-law at high freestream turbulence levels. Velocity defects in the outer region of the boundary layer were significantly decreased resulting in negative wake parameters. Fluctuating rms velocities were only affected when the freestream turbulence levels exceeded the levels of the boundary layer generated rms velocities. Length scales and power spectra measurements showed large scale turbulent eddies penetrate to within y+ = 15 of the wall.

Complex vortical secondary flows that are present near the endwall of an axial gas turbine blade are responsible for high heat transfer rates and high aerodynamic losses. The application of nonaxisymmetric, three-dimensional contouring to the endwall surface has been shown to reduce the strength of the vortical flows and decrease total pressure losses when compared with a flat endwall. The reduction in secondary flow strength with nonaxisymmetric contouring might also be expected to reduce endwall heat transfer. In this study, measurements of endwall heat transfer were taken for a low-pressure turbine blade geometry with both flat and three-dimensional contoured endwalls. Endwall oil flow visualization indicated a reduction in the passage vortex strength for the contoured endwall geometry. Heat transfer levels were reduced by 20% in regions of high heat transfer with the contoured endwall, as compared with the flat endwall. The heat transfer benefit of the endwall contour was not affected by changes in the cascade Reynolds number.

One viable option to improve cooling methods used for gas turbine blades is to optimize the geometry of the film-cooling hole. To optimize that geometry, effects of the hole geometry on the complex jet-in-crossflow interaction need to be understood. This paper presents a comparison of detailed flowfield measurements for three different single, scaled-up, hole geometries all at a blowing ratio and density ratio of unity. The hole geometries include a round hole, a hole with a laterally expanded exit, and a hole with a forward-laterally expanded exit. In addition to the flowfield measurements for expanded cooling hole geometries being unique to the literature, the testing facility used for these measurements was also unique in that both the external mainstream Mach number (Ma∞ = 0.25) and internal coolant supply Mach number (Mac = 0.3) were nearly matched. Results show that by expanding the exit of the cooling holes, the penetration of the cooling jet as well as the intense shear regions are significantly reduced relative to a round hole. Although the peak turbulence levels for all three hole geometries was nominally the same, the source of that turbulence was different. The peak turbulence level for both expanded holes was located at the exit of the cooling hole resulting from the expansion angle being too large. The peak turbulence level for the round hole was located downstream of the hole exit where the velocity gradients were very large.

One viable option to improve cooling methods used for gas turbine blades is to optimize the geometry of the film-cooling hole. To optimize that geometry, effects of the hole geometry on the complex jet-in-crossflow interaction need to be understood. This paper presents a comparison of detailed flowfield measurements for three different single, scaled-up hole geometries, all at a blowing ratio and density ratio of unity. The hole geometries include a round hole, a hole with a laterally expanded exit, and a hole with a forward-laterally expanded exit. In addition to the flowfield measurements for expanded cooling hole geometries being unique to the literature, the testing facility used for these measurements was also unique in that both the external mainstream Mach number (Ma∞ = 0.25) and internal coolant supply Mach number (Mac = 0.3) were nearly matched. Results show that by expanding the exit of the cooling holes, both the penetration of the cooling jet and the intense shear regions are significantly reduced relative to a round hole. Although the peak turbulence level for all three hole geometries was nominally the same, the source of that turbulence was different. The peak turbulence level for both expanded holes was located at the exit of the cooling hole resulting from the expansion angle being too large. The peak turbulence level for the round hole was located downstream of the hole exit where the velocity gradients were very large.

Recent technological advances in the field of additive manufacturing (AM), particularly with direct metal laser sintering (DMLS), have increased the potential for building gas turbine components with AM. Using DMLS for turbine components broadens the design space and allows for increasingly small and complex geometries to be fabricated with little increase in time or cost. Challenges arise when attempting to evaluate the advantages of DMLS for specific applications, particularly because of how little is known regarding the effects of surface roughness. This paper presents pressure drop and heat transfer results of flow through small, as produced channels that have been manufactured using DMLS in an effort to better understand roughness. Ten different coupons made with DMLS all having multiple rectangular channels were evaluated in this study. Measurements were collected at various flow conditions and reduced to a friction factor and a Nusselt number. Results showed significant augmentation of these parameters compared to smooth channels, particularly with the friction factor for mini-channels with small hydraulic diameters. However, augmentation of Nusselt number did not increase proportionally with the augmentation of the friction factor.