Design and Optimization of an Axial Expansion Turbine for Energy Recovery

The paper presents a methodology for designing the stator and rotor blades for an axial expansion turbine, with optimisation procedure with respect to cavitation behaviour. The resulting stator-rotor thin blades tandem is analysed using unsteady, incompressible and inviscid flow simulation in order to validate the quasi-analytical design method and associated computer code. Finally, thickness is added to the thin blade (camberline) to insure structural integrity and the resulting configuration is analyzed in turbulent flow.