Influence of loading distribution on the performance of transonic high pressure turbine blades

Midspan measurements were made in a transonic wind tunnel for three high pressure turbine blade cascades at design incidence. The baseline profile is the midspan section of a high pressure turbine blade of fairly recent design. It is considered mid-loaded. To gain a better understanding of blade loading limits and the influence of loading distributions, the profile of the baseline airfoil was modified to create two new airfoils having aft-loaded and front-loaded pressure distributions. Tests were performed for exit Mach numbers between 0.6 and 1.2. In addition, measurements were made for an extended range of Reynolds numbers for constant Mach numbers of 0.6, 0.85, 0.95, and 1.05. At the design exit Mach number of 1.05, the aft-loaded airfoil showed a reduction of almost 20% in the total pressure losses compared with the baseline airfoil. However it was also found that for Mach numbers higher than the design value the performance of the aft-loaded blade deteriorated rapidly. The front-loaded airfoil showed generally inferior performance compared with the baseline airfoil.