Francis Turbine Simulation Benchmark Introdution

This study presents a complex step-by-step analysis of a Francis turbine from its preprocessing to an advanced CFD & FEA simulation, including FSI and modal analysis. The simulation software used for this analysis is TCAE – a comprehensive simulation environment based on open-source. This particular Francis hydro turbine is a CFD benchmark validation of a real existing turbine. This project was made together with Hidroenergia, a hydro turbine manufacturing company. This project is unique because the real existing hydropower turbine was physically measured and the measurement data were compared with the data from the CFD simulation by TCAE. The main goal of this benchmark is to compare the turbine efficiency and power of the TCAE simulation results with the real experimental measurement data measured by Hidroenergia.

Another goal of this study is to show in detail how to make a comprehensive CFD & FEA + FSI analysis of the Francis turbine characteristics: efficiency, head, torque, power, pressure, cavitation properties, material stress of the runner, material displacement of the runner, modal analysis of the runner, and many more.