Heat Transfer Characteristics Analysis on a Fully Cooled Vane With Varied Density Ratios

The objective of this experimental investigation was to determine the cooling performance of a fully cooled vane with 18 rows of cylinder cooling holes. The exit Reynolds number in the wind tunnel normalized by the true chord was 500,000 with an inlet turbulence intensity of 15%. The film cooling effectiveness and heat transfer coefficient distribution were obtained by the transient liquid crystal (TLC) technology, three mass flow ratios (MFRs = 7.0%, 9.9%, 11%) and two density ratios (DRs = 1.0, 1.5) were tested. The results show that the film cooling effectiveness distribution on the suction side is more uniform and the coolant injection trajectory is much longer than that on the pressure side. As the density ratio increasing to 1.5, the more laterally uniform film cooling effectiveness contour on the pressure side is observed and the spatially averaged film cooling effectiveness is increased by 11–43%. For the MFR = 7.0%, the coolant injection with low momentum thickens the boundary layer and reduces the heat transfer coefficient in the mid-chord region of the pressure side. Both the increased mass flow ratio and decreased density ratio result in a higher heat transfer coefficient, while do not alter the distribution trend. By calculating the heat flux ratio, the reduction in the heat flux at DR = 1.5 is found to be within 20% in most areas than that of DR = 1.0 on the vane surface.