Identification of Flow Structures on a LP Turbine Blade Due to Periodic Passing Wakes

The paper describes the flow structures on the suction surface of a highly cambered low-pressure turbine (LPT) blade (T106 profile) subjected to periodic convective wakes. A separation bubble on the rear half of the suction side of the blade was found to form under the operating condition due to the highly diffusive boundary layer. Interactions of migrating wakes with this separated boundary layer trigger rollup of the shear layer leading to transition and the appearance of coherent vortices. To characterize the dynamics of these large-scale structures, a proper orthogonal decomposition is pursued on both the fluctuating velocity and the vorticity fields generated by large-eddy simulations (LESs) of wake passing over the LPT blade for a Reynolds number $Re=1.6×105$⁠. The first two modes clearly depict the rollup of the unstable shear layer and formation of large-scale vortex loops that contain a major fraction of the fluctuation energy. The present LES, at least in a qualitative sense, illustrates the large-scale motions in the outer layer and dynamics of vortical structures in a separated boundary layer excited by external perturbations.