Numerical analysis of non-equilibrium steam condensing flows in various Laval nozzles and cascades

When steam is used in fluid machinery, phase transition can occur that affects not only the flow fields but also machine performance. Therefore, to achieve an accurate prediction of steam condensing flow using computational fluid dynamics (CFD), phase-transition phenomena should be considered and a non-equilibrium wet-steam model is required. Such a model is implemented in this study using the in-house code T-Flow, and the flow fields – including phase-transition phenomena – in various Laval nozzles are examined. The results for multi-phase flows can be obtained in relatively short time by using mixture assumption and an inner-iteration method. The calculated results reflect the characteristics of the condensing flows well and are comparable with those obtained experimentally. Also, it was found that the superheating level of incoming steam can explain the tendency of condensation in the nozzles considered in a simple way. In addition, steam condensing flows in the blade cascades were simulated. As a result, the predicted blade loading agreed well with the experimental data and the superheating level at inlet was responsible for the condensation trend not only in the nozzles but also in the cascades. In future work, the characteristics of steam condensing flow in a steam turbine where complex flows and phase transition occur can be investigated using the presented model.