29-1

Rotating Pip Detection and Stall Warning in High-Speed Compressors Using Structure Function
Michelle M. Bright NASA Lewis Research Center Cleveland, Ohio 44135 email: mbright@lerc.nasa.gov Helen Qammar, Hanif Vhora, Michael Schaffer Department of Chemical Engineering University of Akron Akron, OH 44325, USA 1. SUMMARY A statistic for both rotating pip and incipient stall detection, called Structure Function is introduced for use in high speed research compressor environments. Experimental studies on stall inception processes have long observed two types of pre-stall compressor activity. Presently there exist methods for indicating modal stall precursive events in the compressor. This is a first application of a new method to detect rotating pip activity prior to stall in research compressors. The algorithm requires a very short sample of data to distinguish pip activity prior to stall, and thus may be used in a real time application. Additionally, this Structure Function algorithm is also used as a single sensor stall warning method under a variety of operating conditions, including clean inlet conditions, radially and circumferentially distorted inlet conditions, and in examples of steady air injection along the casing, and controlled air injection conditions. Structure Function provides a potential advantage over linear spectral techniques and wavelet algorithms for stall detection due to the simplicity of the algorithm and because it does not rely on a priori knowledge of frequency content. 2. INTRODUCTION Research in the area of compressor rotating stall has focused on three distinct areas: modeling the stall inception phenomenon to accurately capture fluid physical instabilities occurring prior to stall; detecting the stall inception phenomenon through knowledge of both the modeled characteristics of pre-stall behavior and observed experimental pre-stall events; and controlling stall through the fast and fervent application of knowledge from modeling and predicting. Since a recent emphasis has been placed on the fast identification and control of pre-stall disturbances, a reliable pre-stall indicator is necessary for future active stall control applications. Many of the present schemes for active stall control in experimental compressors are model based. This paper will focus on a prediction technique that is not modelbased, but is robust in monitoring short length-scale rotating stall instabilities in experimental high speed compressors. Models of the stall inception process have been documented by many authors. In a combined theoretical and experimental paper, Moore and Greitzer (1986) predict and detect stall inception patterns in low speed compressors. Their observations are of modal stall inception patterns of long length-scale circumferential velocity perturbations. These patterns are further documented by Hendricks (1993) and Day (1993). These modal patterns appear when the compressor stages are well matched, often during low speed operation in the front stages, and are affected by both inlet distortion and stage mismatch in their axial extent. (see Camp, 1997) These authors suggest that modal patterns occur at 50% or less of the fundamental rotational frequency of the compressor and grow in amplitude into rotating stall. Observations of short length scale phenomenon in the compressor prior to stall have also been shown. In papers by Day (1993) Camp (1997) and Gamier (1991) there is evidence of pip stall inception patterns and combined modal and pip patterns prior to stall in several high speed compressor configurations. The formation of these pip instabilities is attributable to both stage mismatch and inlet conditions. These pip disturbances may grow in amplitude or change speed prior to rotating stall. Often these disturbances are localized to a particular blade row, however, they may propagate around the annulus. In papers by Spakovszky (1998) and Bright (1998), it is suggested that pips propagate around the circumference and then instigate modal stall during circumferential inlet distortion conditions. In the area of detection, the existing methods to identify stall precursive events are often categorized based on the length scale of the disturbance, either long (modal) or short (pip). In a paper by Tryfonidis (1995), the emphasis is to study long length scale phenomenon that leads to rotating stall. Other investigations by Day (1993) and

Paper presented at the RTO AVT Symposium on Design Principles and Methods for Aircrafr Gas Turbine Engines, held in Toulouse, France, 11-15 May 1998, and published in RTO MP-8.

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Park (1994) observe pip activity in the compressor, however, they do not provide schemes for detection of this pip activity. It is in the area of controlling rotating stall that many recent contributions have been reported, specifically by Paduano (1993), Feulner (1994), and Haynes (1993). In a report by Weigl (1997) on the active stabilization of stall in high speed compressors, modal activity was suppressed through controlled air injection. However, it is suggested that subsequent pip activity instigated the controller to go unstable. Freeman (1997) describes the use of both air injection and controlled bleed in concert to actively suppress rotating stall in a high speed multistage compressor rig. It is specifically from evidence in these active control cases that a pip detection method would prove advantageous. Certainly, with these control capabilities in mind, it would be beneficial to have a pip detector working in concert with a modal stall detector to help stabilize the compressor. In the present paper, we discuss such a prediction technique called Structure Function. This statistical method is used on a variety of experimental results from several compressor configurations. We will identify in these compressors the short length scale phenomenon present prior to rotating stall through visual inspection of the pressure traces. With this data we will then use the Structure Function algorithm to clearly show from a single pressure trace the onset of instabilities leading to stall. We will also show the growth and rotation of pip instabilities in data acquired from 8 equidistant pressure sensors at a single axial location. The Structure Function algorithm consistently predicts the onset of pip instabilities in all the compressors without any false positive results. The experimental results will include examples from single stage transonic compressors with clean and distorted inlet flow, with steady and controlled air injection upstream of the compressor face, and in an axi-centrifugal multistage rig experiment.

application, to detect incipient stall using a single sensor. The temporal structure function, SF is:

SF=

$[x(i+O-x(i)1

It is closely related to the RSS (reconstruction signal strength) statistic from chaotic dynamics and is also related to the correlation function. The SF is often more convenient to use than a correlation function in cases when one is concerned not with the absolute values of the quantities, but only with their differences at distinct instances in time. For example, in detecting a pip we are not concerned with monitoring the magnitude of the pressure rise as much as noting when there exists a noticeable local disturbance. The statistic is the average squared difference between temporally separated points over a window N, which is the stationary increment. One way to view the SF is an amplitude enhancer. When a relatively large spike is located in the pressure signal, this spike will contribute a significant value to the SF as long as N and t are correctly chosen. To detect a rotating pip, we choose N to be small since we expect the amplitude rise to be very short-lived. If instead we want to detect incipient stall, we choose a much larger value for N, so that the statistic is not overly sensitive to local amplitude excursions and can react to the repetitive increases in amplitude found just prior to stall. The time delay, t, is selected to be approximately half the period of the oscillation of interest, that is approximately 70%-90% rotor speed for pip frequency detection or 35%-50% rotor speed for modal frequency detection in order to maximize the amplitude enhancing effect of the SF. With careful selection of N and t the SF does have the desired attributes of either a pip detector as discussed above or a single sensor stall warning technique. 4. EXPERIMENTAL CONFIGURATION

3. STRUCTURE

FUNCTION

The structure function has historically been associated with the study of random variables. In particular, Kolmogorov (1941) has shown the use of structure function in random processes with stationary increments. It is a simple statistic which has been extensively used in turbulence research to measure moments in the spatial direction (Panchev, 1971). In this paper we consider a temporal structure function for two distinct applications: first, to detect the local amplitude bursts found in rotating pip instabilities using eight sensors and, in another

Experimental data to validate the use of structure function was recorded from several compressors in a series of experiments that occurred between 1994 and 1997. The data sets were collected on the high speed single stage compressor rig at NASA Lewis, running either stage 35 or stage 37. Configurations of the NASA stage 35 and 37 compressor included clean inlet conditions, radial distortion, circumferential distortion, steady air injection and controlled injected air upstream of the first rotor. These cases are further described in Spakovszky (1998). An additional data set is shown from the Allied Signal T55 experimental compressor rig (as described in Owen,

29-3 1995). All the examples shown were transitioned into stall using a slow throttling maneuver. In all the single stage test cases, data was acquired using 5 psi range a/c coupled pressure transducers at eight equally resolved locations around the annulus. The data was recorded at 3 Kilohertz sampling rate. All of the single stage results were taken from the NASA Lewis Research Center Single-Stage Axial Compressor Test Facility which is fully described in Weigl (1997). The NASA Stage 35 test compressor was originally designed as an inlet stage of an eight-stage 20: 1 pressure ratio core compressor (Reid 1978, Moore 1980). The stage has a total pressure ratio of 1.82, a mass flow of 20.2 kg/s, a rotor tip speed of 455 m/s, and a rotation frequency of 286 Hz at design speed. 5. DETECTION OF ROTATING PIPS the development of traveling modes can be seen at approximately 33 rotor revolutions. At 33 rotor revolutions it then appears that modal waves are instigated. Evidence that a local instability such as a pip can trigger modal behavior in the compressor was also found by Garnier (1990). The SF with N = 4 and t = 2 was computed for each sensor. Figure 5 shows a rotating pip starting at sensor 4 and completing more than one full revolution. The SF does not detect any rotating behavior during the modal transition into stall primarily because the SF window is very small and does not respond to the low frequency oscillations. 6. DETECTION OF INCIPIENT STALL

Figure 1 shows the unfiltered pressure traces for stage 37 with radial inlet distortion. No modes are noticeable in this case but a rotating pip instability can be found two rotor revolutions prior to stall. Pips are also seen from 35 to 38 revolutions before stall. In either case, the cause of the pips is not obvious from the pressure traces. The SF was computed for each pressure transducer using a delay of 2 and a window length, N, of 4. The window is shifted one point and the next SF computed. When the SF is higher than the previous 20 values, a marker is placed on that sensor. Figure 2 shows the markers computed for the pressure traces entering stall. When a succession of eight sensors are marked within 1.8 rotor revolutions, a rotating pip is said to have occurred as indicated by the asterisks on the bottom of the figure. Our SF algorithm correctly detects the rotating pip in the same position as observed by Spakovszky (1998). Figure 3 shows the SF analysis from 42 through 28 rotor revolutions before stall where pips are noticeable in the pressure traces. In our analysis, we find that the pip instability does not complete a full rotation as indicated by the dashed lines in Figure 3. The start of a rotating pip is seen at sensor 1 but is stopped at sensor 7 because no relatively significant increase in amplitude is found at that sensor. At 36 rotor revolutions another rotating pip appears to start at sensor I but does not continue past sensor 4. In this case, the pips of sensor 4 and 5 occur at the same time as the pip in sensor 3 and therefore are more indicative of a wave rather than a traveling pip instability. Another example of local, pip instabilities was found in stage 37 with circumferential inlet distortion present. Figure 4 shows the unfiltered pressures traces for 50 rotor revolutions prior to stall. A rotating pip which precedes

The SF can also be used as a single sensor incipient stall warning technique. Rather than monitoring rotating characteristics in the compressor dynamic, this stall detection technique relies on the gradual increase in the amplitude of the oscillations found just prior to stall. Band pass filtering the data enhances the amplitude rise and in turn the SF values. In this off-line study, we found that a band-pass filter which encompasses one half of a prominent frequency band - as seen from a power spectrum - yields good results. An explanation for this is not available but may be related to the fact that the temporal SF can be equated to other signal processing concepts (Vhora, 1998). In all the cases that follow, we select a data window of 200 and a delay of 5 for the SF calculation. Figure 6 shows the results of the structure function analysis for a single sensor of data from the radial distortion case of Figure 1. At the top of Figure 6 is shown the unfiltered pressure data. In the middle of Figure 6 is the normalized, zero averaged, filtered data used as input to the structure function. Both the unfiltered and filtered data are shown although the SF is computed only on the filtered data. The bottom figure shows the computed structure function value for the normalized data. At approximately 50 rotor revolutions before stall, the filtered data exhibits a series of oscillations, each with a higher amplitude than the previous oscillations. Because the window length is relatively long, the SF steadily increases rather than travel in phase with the oscillation. When the SF has passed some arbitrary limit, as indicated by the short horizontal line, we assume stall is imminent. In this case a stall warning results at 40 rotor revolutions before stall compared to two revolutions with the pip detector. A similar result is obtained in the radial distortion with constant air injection case. A distinct rise in amplitude of the oscillations begins at 60 revolutions before stall in the filtered, normalized data, along with a corresponding rise

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in the SF. Again the SF delivers a stall warning at 40 revolutions prior to stall. We have experimented with the structure function as a stall warning technique on a wide variety of compressor data. A few additional examples are presented below to show the utility of this method. The SF stall warning technique yields good results when applied to a clean inlet stage as referenced from Weigl (1997). The results in Figure 8 show a distinct rise in SF value at 250 revolutions before stall. An additional result is shown in Figure 9 for a case with controlled air injection, also referenced from Weigl(l997). In this case, controlled air upstream of the rotor was actively stabilizing the first two harmonic modes and the surge mode while the compressor was throttled into stall. In this case the SF shows a distinct rise well before stall that is not attributed to modal stall onset. For this case the SF indicates when the modal controller is destabilizing at 500 revolutions before stall. In all cases given we find ample warning time to take action upon impending stall. The final case involves a multi-stage T.55 rig with a single sensor placed at the front of the first stage. Modal behavior is found throughout the pressure signal as shown in the top of Figure 10. When the signal is low-passed filtered, an obvious growth in the oscillation amplitude is found in the pre-stall region. SF makes use of this effect and shows a marked increase starting at 20 revolutions before stall. This is the first example of a stall warning method applied to a multi-stage rig which uses information from a single sensor. 7. CONCLUSIONS The structure function is an effective statistical measure to detect both rotating pips and incipient stall. Although this statistic has been used extensively by the turbulence community, this is the first application of it for pip detection and incipient stall. warning. From this off-line study, the structure function successfully detected traveling pip instabilities prior to stall in both a radially distorted experimental stage and in a circumferentially distorted stage. Structure function also was used as a single sensor incipient stall detector. In the radial distortion case, the circumferential distortion case, the clean inlet case, and the controlled injection case, this technique warned of the onset of rotating stall at least 40 rotor revolutions in advance. In the clean inlet case the warning was 500 revolutions before stall. In the multi-stage T55 rig data, the warning was 20 rotor revolutions.

In order to most effectively use this method in conjunction with active control, we need to further examine the effects of signal conditioning the data before structure function is applied. Additionally, we will study the appropriate online selection of window length and time delay for stall or pip detection. This will lead to an on-line implementation in conjunction with an active controller. This method should prove very useful in experimental rig or engine environments where it is not practical to install multiple sensors. While the structure function appears at first glance to be overly simplistic, it seems to be well suited to the task of on-line pip and incipient stall detection. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This research was funded in part through an Ohio Aerospace Institute Phase I Research Grant and a NSF Career Development Award (CTS - 9502327). The authors thank Tony Strazisar (NASA Lewis) for critical analysis and support and Ivor Day (Cambridge) for fruitful discussions on rotating pips. Additional thanks go to Faramarz Mossayebi (University of Wisconsin) for important information on the relationship between SF and other statistical quantities. REFERENCES Camp, T. R. and Day, I. J., A Study of Spike and Modal Stall Phenomena in a Low-Speed Axial Compressor, in ASME Gas Turbine Conference, Orlando, FL, June, 1997. Day, I. J., Stall Inception in Axial Flow Compressors, Journal of Turbomachinery, Vol. 115, No. 1, January 1993. Hoying, D. A., Stall Inception in a Multistage High Speed Axial Compressor, ASME Journal of Propulsion and Power, Vol. 11, No. 5.. September 1995. Kolmogorov, A. N., Dissipation of Energy in Locally Isotropic Turbulence, Doklady Acad. Sci., USSR 32, 1941. Longley, J. P., Calculating the Flowfield Behaviour of High-Speed Multi-Stage Compressors, Presented at the ASME IGTI, Orlando, Florida, 1997. Moore, D. and Reid, L., Performance of Single-Stage Axial-Flow Transonic Compressor with Rotor and Stator Aspect Ratios of 1.19 and 1.26, Respectively, and with Design Pressure Ratio of 2.05. NASA Technical Paper 1659, April 1980.

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Paduano, J. D., Epstein, A.H., Valavani, L., Langley, J. P., Greitzer, E. M., and Guenette, G. R., Active Control of Rotating Stall in a Low Speed Axial Compressor, Journal of Turbomachinery, Vol. 115, January 1993.
Radial Distortion. Pips Case

Panchev, S., Random Functions Pergamum Press, Oxford, 197 1.

and

Turbulence,

Design and Overall Reid, L. and Moore, D., Performance of Four Highly Loaded, High-Speed Inlet Stages for an Advanced High-Pressure-Ratio Core Compressor, NASA Technical Paper 1337, 1978. Rosenstein, M., J. Collins, and C. DeLuca, Reconstruction Expansion as a Geometry-Based Framework For Chosing Proper Delay Times, Physica D, 73, 82-98, 1994. Spakovzsky, Z., Weigl, H., Paduano, J., Suder, K., Bright, M., Rotating Stall Control in a High-Speed Stage with Inlet Distortion, Part I, presented at the ASME IGTI, Stockholm, 1998a. Spakovzsky, Z., VanSchalkwyk, C., Paduano, J., Suder, K., Bright, M., Rotating Stall Control in a High-Speed Stage with Inlet Distortion, Part II, presented at the ASME IGTI, Stockholm, 1998b. Tryfonidis, M., Etchevers, 0.. Paduano, J. D., Epstein, A. H., and Hendricks, G. J., Pre-Stall Behavior of Several High-Speed Compressors, Journal of Turbomachinery, Vol. 117, January 1995, p. 62. Vhora, H., Masters Thesis, Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Akron, May 1998. Weigl, H.J., Paduano, J. D., Frechette, L.G., Epstein, A.H., Greitzer, E. M., Bright, M. M., Strazisar, A.J., Active Stabilization of Rotating Stall and Surge in a Transonic Single Stage Axial Compressor, accepted for publication in Journal of Turbomachinery, ASME Gas Turbine Conference, 1997.
Revolutions Before Stall

Figure 1. Pressure Traces for Radial Distortion

Figure 2. Pressure Traces 10 Revolutions Before Stall

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Figure 3. Pressure Traces 42 to 28 Revolutions

Figure 5. Pressure Traces for Circumferential Distortion 38 to 20 Revolutions before Stall

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Distortton.

Pips Case

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Before Stall

Figure 4. Pressure Traces for Circumferential

Distortion

Figure 6. Structure Function Results Radial Distortion

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Figure 10. Structure Function Results T55 Rig