Three-Dimensional Flow Field Measurements in a Transonic Turbine Cascade

Three-dimensional flow field measurements are presented for a large scale transonic turbine blade cascade. Flow field total pressures and pitch and yaw flow angles were measured at an inlet Reynolds number of 1.0 × 10⁶ and at an isentropic exit Mach number of 1.3 in a low turbulence environment. Flow field data was obtained on five pitchwise/spanwise measurement planes, two upstream and three downstream of the cascade, each covering three blade pitches. Three-hole boundary layer probes and five-hole pitch/yaw probes were used to obtain data at over 1200 locations in each of the measurement planes. Blade and endwall static pressures were also measured at an inlet Reynolds number of 0.5 × 10⁶ and at an isentropic exit Mach number of 1.0. Tests were conducted in a linear cascade at the NASA Lewis Transonic Turbine Blade Cascade Facility. The test article was a turbine rotor with 136° of turning and an axial chord of 12.7 cm. The flow field in the cascade is highly three-dimensional as a result of thick boundary layers at the test section inlet and because of the high degree of flow turning. The large scale allowed for very detailed measurements of both flow field and surface phenomena. The intent of the work is to provide benchmark quality data for CFD code and model verification.