Forced Response of a Centrifugal Compressor Stage Due to the Impeller-Diffuser Interaction

The impact mode coupling between impeller blades and the disk backwall has on the forced response amplitude of impeller blades is assessed. The assessments focus on the forced response of two splitter blade modes to a variety of representative boundary conditions and unsteady loadings. The forcing function is the synchronous unsteady loading generated by the impeller-diffuser interaction at resonance. The results indicate that modal coupling of blade-and disk-dominant modes renders the forced response highly sensitive to small variations in airfoil and disk backwall thickness. As a complement, a reduced-order model based on the forced response of a two mass-spring system is used to elucidate the physical interaction of modal coupling. The practical implication of this finding is that a forced response issue with an impeller blade cannot be addressed adequately by stiffening the structure, such as thickening the blade or disk. Thus, appropriate measures need to be taken to avoid potential blade-disk mode couplings within the manufacturing tolerances of the part.