Cooling-rate-oriented structural optimization process for hollowed gas turbine engine blade via computational fluid dynamic analysis

To address the balance between design and manufacturing in the structural optimization of gas turbine blade cooling efficiency, this study simultaneously considers the impacts of both design and manufacturing factors on the blade shape and structure. Through sensitivity analysis, the effects of these dual factors on cooling performance and load response are revealed. To facilitate this, an efficient turbine blade modeling program based on parametric modeling is developed, which ensures accurate geometry creation while also supporting the import of parameter files for subsequent structural optimization. Structural design criteria and casting process constraints are first considered, and several key parameters for structural optimization are proposed. Experiments are designed, followed by computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations to obtain key result parameters related to the variation in structural stresses induced by the workflow. Response surface methodology (RSM) is then used to fit regression equations, which are subsequently applied in Sobol sensitivity analysis to evaluate the effects of design and manufacturing parameters on blade cooling efficiency. Finally, structural optimization is performed using the NSGA-II algorithm, yielding the Pareto frontier for the key parameters. This workflow provides new insights into the structural optimization of hollow gas turbine engine blades.