Parametric design and multi-objective optimization on blade high-pressure side of a pump-turbine

Abstract High pressure side, as the runner outlet at pump mode and runner inlet at turbine mode, playing an important role in controlling hydraulic loss and flow characteristics in vaneless region, affecting both steady characteristics and unsteady characteristics. While when it comes to three-dimensional inverse design of a pump-turbine blade, scholars are forces on the design method in runner flow channel, ignoring the geometry profile of high-pressure side. Hence, in present paper, concepts “swept”, “bowed (lean)” and “twisted” are innovatively introduced, eight new parameters are proposed to control the profile of blade high pressure side. And then a multi-objective optimization design system consisting of geometry generation, computational fluid dynamics, design of experiment, approximation model, multi-objective genetic algorithm, and self-organization map is built. Efficiency at both pump mode and turbine mode and S margin at turbine mode are selected as optimization objectives in the first optimization step. Then, the hump margin is regard as the objective in the second optimization step. Based on the two-step optimization, a runner with optimized high-pressure side is obtained and CFD results show that compared with the original runner, the efficiency at rated points and the margin of unsteady characteristics can be increased. The parametric design method on high-pressure side presented in our paper can be regard as an essential supplement to the traditional design method in hydraulic machinery.