Feasibility Study of a Radical Vane-Integrated Heat Exchanger for Turbofan Engine Applications

The density of liquid hydrogen (LH2), at the normal boiling point, is two times higher than that of highly compressed hydrogen. This makes LH2 the prime candidate for hydrogen storage in aviation. However, LH2 is stored at cryogenic temperatures that require adequate insulation, as well as the integration of heat exchangers to warm up the hydrogen on its way to the combustion chamber. Ideally, the required heat exchangers are strategically placed in the engine core to produce optimum heat management, thus improving the engine efficiency, increase its durability as well as to reduce emissions. Moreover, the combination of hydrogen high specific heat with cryogenic temperatures results in formidable cooling capacity, that can be explored by more compact HEX solutions. The present work numerically investigates a novel concept of a compact compressor vane-integrated heat exchanger, for application in cryogenically fuelled gas turbine engines. The baseline engine used for establishing the HEX requirements is a large geared turbofan, operating on liquid hydrogen. The HEX aero-thermal performance is first estimated using zero-dimensional models and Chalmers in-house gas turbine performance tool GESTPAN. After, the conceptual design of an outlet guide vane-HEX is developed and integrated into a three-stage low-pressure compressor. The baseline compressor geometry is a lightly loaded high-speed booster with a design pressure ratio of 2.8. The multi-stage compressor with the integrated HEX is evaluated using steady-state computational fluid dynamics. Results allow to estimate the heat exchanger performance in terms of total pressure loss, heat transfer effectiveness, and the potential enhanced radial flow turning capability. Further, the impact of the new developed OGV-HEX on the compressor characteristics is also reported and discussed