Importance

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Abstract

A simple, rugged and wide velocity range radial flow turbine wheel, with entry flow radially inward and exhaust flow radially outward, has an efficient integral fluid-dynamic multiple staging system needing no stationary devices for redirecting the fluid. Consequently there are no clearance problems, and it can be used with all fluids, including contaminated ones. The tangentially-entering fluid stream is captured and trapped in an annular passageway between an outer set of circumferentially mounted blades and a carefully coordinated inner set of circumferentially mounted planar surfaces. Energy is extracted from the stream when the flow direction is changed each time the faster-moving fluid is vectored radially inwardly from a blade to an inner surface, then vectored radially outwardly to the next blade, then to the next inner surface, etc. All of the pressure, lift and drag forces contribute to turbine output. Flow of the fluid continues around the annular passageway, which also has integral lateral boundaries, until such time as the relative velocity of the fluid and the rotating blades reaches zero. Then the fluid is exhausted radially outwardly by centrifugal force between the blades, which can no longer maintain their trapping action. Because fluid exhaust can occur anywhere on the periphery except in the entry zone itself, flow conditions in the wheel can adapt to wide ranges of speed and loading. The fluid can experience thousands of degrees of magnitude of angular directional change in a single circumferential passage relative to the moving wheel.

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First Claim