Experimental Investigation on the Mechanism of Impeller Synchronous and Nonsynchronous Vibrations in an Industrial Centrifugal Compressor

Abstract Understanding of the fluid–structure interaction phenomena in centrifugal compressors is essential for the impeller structural integrity design. To enhance the understanding of blade vibration in a realistic flow environment, a single-stage centrifugal compressor representative of industrial architecture has been investigated experimentally. For deterministic synchronous vibrations, the response amplitudes at different operating lines are measured and compared. The fundamental relations between flow excitation and rotor modal resonance are established by pairwise strain gages from experimental perspective. Compared with the third mode, the impeller first bending mode shows traveling wave response characteristic only within the frequency band where two adjacent blades have the same resonant frequency. Besides, the impeller encounters unexpected nonsynchronous vibrations when operating near the flow instability boundary. Speed ramp tests show that the stall cell propagating speed increases along with the rotor rotational speed without changing the cell count. Response amplification is further measured when throttling the compressor into stall. Experimental findings point toward vaned diffuser rotating stall and the corresponding propagating pressure waves in circumference leads to the impeller vibration. The aerodynamic asymmetry of stall cells increases the possibility of aeroelastic coupling with the blade modes. These results contribute to an in-depth understanding of the aeroelastic phenomena in industrial centrifugal compressors. The observed nonsynchronous vibration is important for the aeroelastic design and also of great interest for numerical predictions near stall.