Title:
Simultaneous multi-design point approach to gas turbine on-design cycle analysis for aircraft engines

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Author(s)
Schutte, Jeffrey Scott
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Advisor(s)
Mavris, Dimitri N.
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Abstract
Gas turbine engines for aircraft applications are required to meet multiple performance and sizing requirements, subject to constraints established by the best available technology level. The performance requirements and limiting values of constraints that are considered by the cycle analyst conducting an engine cycle design occur at multiple operating conditions. The traditional approach to cycle analysis chooses a single design point with which to perform the on-design analysis. Additional requirements and constraints not transpiring at the design point must be evaluated in off-design analysis and therefore do not influence the cycle design. Such an approach makes it difficult to design the cycle to meet more than a few requirements and limits the number of different aerothermodynamic cycle designs that can reasonably be evaluated. Engine manufacturers have developed computational methods to create aerothermodynamic cycles that meet multiple requirements, but such methods are closely held secrets of their design process. This thesis presents a transparent and publicly available on-design cycle analysis method for gas turbine engines which generates aerothermodynamic cycles that simultaneously meet performance requirements and constraints at numerous design points. Such a method provides the cycle analyst the means to control all aspects of the aerothermodynamic cycle and provides the ability to parametrically create candidate engine cycles in greater numbers to comprehensively populate the cycle design space from which a "best" engine can be selected. This thesis develops the multi-design point on-design cycle analysis method labeled simultaneous MDP. The method is divided into three different phases resulting in an 11 step process to generate a cycle design space for a particular application. Through implementation of simultaneous MDP, a comprehensive cycle design space can be created quickly for the most complex of cycle design problems. Furthermore, the process documents the creation of each candidate engine providing transparency as to how each engine cycle was designed to meet all of the requirements. The simultaneous MDP method is demonstrated in this thesis on a high bypass ratio, separate flow turbofan with up to 25 requirements and constraints and 9 design points derived from a notional 300 passenger aircraft.
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Date Issued
2009-04-06
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Dissertation
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