Aeroacoustic Improvements To Fluidic Chevron Nozzles: NASA Langley Research Center, Hampton, VA, 23681
Aeroacoustic Improvements To Fluidic Chevron Nozzles: NASA Langley Research Center, Hampton, VA, 23681
Aeroacoustic Improvements To Fluidic Chevron Nozzles: NASA Langley Research Center, Hampton, VA, 23681
R=20060018369 2019-09-03T07:20:36+00:00Z
Fluidic chevrons use injected air near the trailing edge of a nozzle to emulate mixing and
jet noise reduction characteristics of mechanical chevrons. While previous investigations of
“first generation” fluidic chevron nozzles showed only marginal improvements in effective
perceived noise levels when compared to nozzles without injection, significant improvements
in noise reduction characteristics were achieved through redesigned “second generation”
nozzles on a bypass ratio 5 model system. The second-generation core nozzles had improved
injection passage contours, external nozzle contour lines, and nozzle trailing edges. The new
fluidic chevrons resulted in reduced overall sound pressure levels over that of the baseline
nozzle for all observation angles. Injection ports with steep injection angles produced lower
overall sound pressure levels than those produced by shallow injection angles. The
reductions in overall sound pressure levels were the result of noise reductions at low
frequencies. In contrast to the first-generation nozzles, only marginal increases in high
frequency noise over that of the baseline nozzle were observed for the second-generation
nozzles. The effective perceived noise levels of the new fluidic chevrons are shown to
approach those of the core mechanical chevrons.
I. Introduction
I N recent years, chevron mixing devices for jet noise reduction have advanced to the point that they are now in
commercial service. Chevrons, or serrations, placed around the trailing edge of either the core or fan exhaust
nozzle promote mixing of the jet flow and result in lower bulk jet velocity and lower noise. Mixing occurs by
penetrating the chevron tip a small distance into the flow and producing streamwise vorticity from the pressure
differential across the chevron. Mechanical chevrons are relatively simple to manufacture and install. However, as
passive devices with a fixed geometry, they have the disadvantage of only being optimized for one flight condition.
They cannot adapt to changes in the flow environment and adjustments cannot be made to compensate for changing
flight operations or installation effects. In addition, thrust losses that occur while generating the mixing remain
during cruise even though noise reduction is generally only needed during takeoff.
Active mixing techniques are particularly attractive as they have the potential to optimize jet noise reduction
throughout flight operations and can be deployed only when noise reduction is necessary and accompanying
performance penalties can be tolerated. One such active mixing technique is to inject air at the trailing edge of the
exhaust nozzle in such a way as to generate similar vorticity and mixing characteristics as the mechanical chevron.
These “fluidic chevrons” can be operated with different injection flow rates or injection location in a way that
optimizes their performance for the given flight condition.
The key to successful noise reduction with chevron nozzles (mechanical or fluidic) is to reduce low frequency
noise and not significantly increase high frequency noise1,2,3. For mechanical chevrons, the number of chevrons, the
serration geometry, and the penetration depth as well as many other factors affect the acoustic radiation resulting
from the chevron nozzle. Comparisons between numerical results and acoustic measurements indicate that some of
*
Reasearcher, Aeroacoustics Branch, MS 166, Hampton, VA 23681.
†
Now at GE Energy, Acoustics Technical Leader, PGT Aerodynamic and Acoustics Technology, P.O. Box 648,
GTTL 1236, Greenville, SC 29602.
‡
Staff Engineer, Acoustics Group, MZ 107N, Chula Vista, CA 91910.
§
Senior Engineer, Acoustics Group, MZ 107N, Chula Vista, CA 91910.
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the most aggressive mixers produce unacceptable levels of high frequency noise that completely offset any low
frequency noise reduction when the effects of human perception of noise are taken into account.
The same potential problem occurs for fluidic chevrons. Henderson et al4. and Kinzie et al5. describe fluidic
chevrons tested in the NASA Langley Jet Noise Laboratory. These fluidic chevrons were the first of their kind
designed with small slots cut near the trailing edge nozzle to allow air to inject into the flow and promote mixing
between the core and fan streams. Various injection parameters were considered including injection port count,
injection pressure ratio, and injector orientation. These “first generation” experiments demonstrated that while low
frequency noise reduction is possible, there is also the potential for significant levels of increased high frequency
noise. While the reason for the high frequency noise could not be demonstrated conclusively, the augmented levels
were generally attributed to details of the injector port design such as flow path and increased thickness of the core
nozzle trailing edge. Henderson et al4. showed that the increase in noise could not be accounted for simply by the
injector noise alone.
This paper reports on a “second generation” fluidic chevron nozzle design that incorporated lessons learned
from the experiments of references 4 and 5. For the second-generation design, more care was taken to design the
internal flow path of the injectors so that the effects of injection angle could be determined. In addition, a special
fabrication process was developed so that the nozzle trailing edge thickness was minimized everywhere.
Microphone Array
Microphone Array
Tunnel Nozzle
JES
Collector
Figure 1. A schematic of the Low Speed Aeroacoustics Wind Tunnel (LSAWT) and the Jet Engine
Simulator (JES).
The Jet Engine Simulator (JES) centered in the free stream jet consists of a coannular air stream used to
accurately simulate engine nozzles systems. Each stream is equipped with a propane-fired, sudden-expansion
burner and an electric pre-heater used to achieve real engine temperatures of commercial turbo-fan engines.
Acoustic measurements are made with a 28-element sideline microphone array (see Fig.1) located at 12 ft from
the centerline axis of the JES. The ¼ in diameter Bruel Kjaer type 4939 are used with the grid caps removed and
calibrated with a piston phone and electrostatic calibrator. One-third octave data includes corrections for
microphone calibration, wind tunnel background noise, and atmospheric absorption (corrected to the same reference
day using the Shields and Bass6 method). The Amiet7 point source correction is used to account for acoustic
propagation through the free jet shear layer. A Doppler shift is used for spectral data. The data is scaled to full scale
and reported at a sideline distance of 1783 ft.
A representative 1/9th scale, bypass ratio (BPR) 5 model system was used in the experiments. The baseline
model consists of an externally plugged, 5.07 in diameter core nozzle with an exit area of 10.98 in2 and a 9.45 in
diameter fan nozzle with an exit area of 29.14 in2. The baseline core nozzle had a uniform thickness of
approximately 0.035” at the trailing edge. (This baseline is different than that used in the previous fluidic chevron
work of Henderson et al.4 and Kinzie et al.5, where the baseline core nozzle consisted of the fluidic chevron nozzle
with no injection flow.) For the fluidic chevron configurations, the baseline core nozzle was replaced with one of
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four, second-generation fluidic chevron nozzles. These second-generation configurations introduced air through the
pylon into contoured injection passages in the core nozzle (see Fig. 2). The injected air entered the core stream
through six slots located near the nozzle trailing edge, spaced around the nozzle circumference. Four fluidic
chevron nozzles were designed for the purpose of determining the effects of injection angle (angle between the
injected flow and the core nozzle flow), slot length, and injection pressure ratio on the radiated noise. Two injection
angles were used, called the steep angle and the shallow angle, with the former indicating an injection velocity more
perpendicular to the direction of the core stream velocity. Three injector exit geometries were used, called the long
slot, the short slot, and the perforated slot. The combinations of injection angle and slot geometry chosen for the
four fluidic chevron core nozzles tested were: Configuration 1 – steep angle, short slot; Configuration 2 – shallow
angle, short slot; Configuration 3 – steep angle, long slot; and Configuration 4 – shallow angle, perforated slot.
The total pressure of the injected air was controlled by a regulator and was measured along with its temperature
in order to calculate the injected mass, momentum and velocity. For proprietary reasons, all the injected air
properties reported are normalized by the maximum value obtained throughout the testing, and the details of the slot
geometries are not given. The
Injection Air Supply pylon was clocked at an angle of
135o to the microphone array axis
for all tests.
Data were acquired at
Pylon representative takeoff and cutback
power conditions although only
data for takeoff power conditions
with flight Mach numbers equal to
0.1 and 0.28 are presented here. In
the experiments, the core nozzle
pressure ratio (NPR, the ratio of the
Fan Nozzle
stagnation pressure to the ambient
pressure), was equal to 1.56 and the
total temperature was 1491 oR. The
Fluidic Chevron
Slotted Core
core nozzle
fan NPR was equal to 1.75 and the
total temperature was 647 oR. For
Figure 2. A schematic of the bypass ratio 5 model system used in the each nozzle and operating
experiments. condition, three or four replications
of the data were taken.
III. Results
The first results presented give the effect of changing the injection pressure on the noise produced by the fluidic
chevron nozzle Configuration 1, the steep angle short slot injector. Figure 3 gives the sideline directivities of the
baseline nozzle and Configuration 1 nozzle
2 dB with three values of injection pressure (where
IPR* is the ratio of the stagnation gage
pressure to its maximum value). For the
fluidic chevrons, the overall sound pressure
OASPL (dB)
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5 dB 5 dB
SPL (dB)
)
(
IPR* = 0.18 IPR* = 0.18
IPR* = 0.64 IPR* = 0.64
IPR* = 1.0 IPR* = 1.0
Baseline Baseline
5 dB
5 dB
)
SPL (dB)
IPR* = 0.18
IPR* = 0.18
IPR* = 0.64 IPR* = 0.64
IPR* = 1.0 IPR* = 1.0
Baseline Baseline
5 dB
5 dB
SPL (dB)
)
(
Short Slot
Short Slot
Long Slot
Long Slot
Baseline
Baseline
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Effect of
injection
OASPL (dB)
SPL (dB)
shaping
5 dB
2 dB
Figure 9. Sideline OASPL directivities for the best Figure 10. The acoustic radiation at an
first-generation fluidic chevron, the best second- observation angle of 90o for the nozzle
generation fluidic chevron, and the baseline nozzle at a configurations in Figure 9.
flight Mach number of 0.28. The IPR* is the same for
both fluidic chevrons.
To reduce the effective perceived noise levels associated with the fluidic chevron nozzles, the maximum noise
reduction at low frequencies in the peak jet noise direction must be achieved while controlling high frequency
increases at broadside angles. The 80 Hz band at an observation angle of 134o was chosen to evaluate low
frequency noise characteristics and the 3160 Hz band at an angle of 90o was chosen to evaluate the high frequency
noise characteristics of the fluidic injectors. A plot of the sound pressure levels in the 80 Hz band at an observation
angle 134o as a function of the component
Baseline of the injection velocity in the direction
perpendicular to the core nozzle flow is
shown in Fig. 11, where the injection
velocity has again been normalized by the
SPL (dB)
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increases in high frequency noise with
increasing injector momentum observed in
Fig. 12 may be related to the injector
penetration depth although increases in
penetration depth appear to decrease low
frequency noise8.
SPL (dB)
Configuration 1
Configuration 2 The effectiveness of the fluidic chevrons
Configuration 3
Configuration 4
at lower flight Mach number can be seen in
Figs 13 through 16. These figures again
1 dB present the sideline directivities and
Baseline
acoustic spectra for Configurations 1 and 2
at different IPR*, now at flight Mach
number 0.10.
0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1 The acoustic characteristics of the
fluidic chevron nozzle with steep injectors
Normalized Perpendicular Momentum
Figure 12. The sound pressure levels produced by all of the at flight Mach number 0.10 (Figs 13 and 14)
second-generation fluidic chevrons in the 3160 Hz band at an are seen to be similar to those at 0.28 (Figs
o
observation angle of 90 as a function of the component of the 3 and 4). At both Mach numbers there is
normalized injection momentum perpendicular to the core high frequency noise increase at 90°and low
frequency decrease at 140°, although these
nozzle flow direction. The flight Mach number is 0.28
effects may be smaller than at Mach 0.28.
The only difference in the trends between
the two Mach numbers is that the increase
2 dB in OASPL at highest injection pressure at
Mach 0.28 is not present at Mach 0.10, due
OASPL (dB)
5 dB 5 dB
SPL (dB)
SPL (dB)
IPR*=0.18 IPR*=0.18
IPR* = 0.45 IPR* = 0.45
IPR*=1.0 IPR*=1.0
Baseline Baseline
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The sideline directivities for the best
(in terms of lowest EPNL) second-
2 dB generation fluidic chevron nozzle, the
baseline nozzle, and a core mechanical
OASPL (dB)
5 dB
5 dB
)
SPL (dB)
2 dB
SPL (dB)
5 dB
Figure 17. Sideline OASPL directivities for the best Figure 18. The acoustic radiation at an observation
second-generation fluidic chevron nozzle, a core angle of 90o for the mechanical chevron, fluidic
mechanical chevron nozzle, and the baseline nozzle at a chevron, and the baseline nozzle at a flight Mach
flight Mach number of 0.10. number of 0.10.
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Table 1. ΔEPNL chevron. Computation of the reductions in effective perceived noise levels for the
Configuration ΔEPNL mechanical and fluidic chevron over that of the baseline nozzle are shown in Table
1. The effective perceived noise levels of the fluidic chevron nozzles are
Fluidic Chevron 0.8 approaching those of the core mechanical chevrons after two generations of
Mechanical Chevron 0.81.1
- 1.1 nozzles. Additional development of the fluidic injection technique may result in
EPNL levels that equal or exceed those of the mechanical chevrons.
IV. Conclusion
Improvements to the injection passages and nozzle trailing edges of the second-generation fluidic chevron
nozzles have resulted in better acoustic performance than those of the first-generation nozzles. High frequency
noise produced by the first-generation nozzles has been reduced with the second-generation nozzles and significant
improvements in effective perceived noise levels have also been achieved. A comparison between the new fluidic
chevrons and the core mechanical chevrons has shown that the acoustic characteristics of the fluidic chevrons are
approaching those of the mechanical chevrons after two generations of nozzles.
Increased low frequency noise reduction in the peak jet noise direction is achieved with increased injection
velocity in the direction perpendicular to the core nozzle flow and, therefore, injectors with steep injection angles
demonstrate better low frequency noise characteristics than those with shallow injection angles for the same mass
injection rate. High frequency noise increases at angles near the broadside of the jet scales with the momentum of
the injected flow. To achieve acceptable effective perceived noise levels, the high frequency increases associated
with increased momentum of the injected flow must be balanced with low frequency reductions associated with
increased injected velocity. Future flow-field measurements with particle image velocimetry will be used to
understand better the connection between the injection flow parameters and the physics of the jet plume.
Acknowledgments
The authors wish to thank the Jet Noise Laboratory staff for their many contributions to the planning and
operation required for the experiment that produced the results written in this paper. Alan Douglas and Harry
Haskin are also acknowledged for leading the mechanical design of the model system.
References
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