Body Force Modelling of a Multi-Stage High-Pressure Compressor Under Inlet Distortion

The present work aims to propose a new calibration strategy of the Hall–Thollet Body Force (BF) model to simulate the flow in multi-stage compressors and to capture inlet distortion effects within the machine. Both global (0D) and radial (1D) correction terms are introduced and calibrated to improve predictions in multi-stage compressors, accounting for highly interacting, highly loaded blades, falling outside the validity range of the model’s original coefficients. The modified model has been tested on the 3.5-stage high-pressure compressor CREATE, for which experimental data are available. The modified model is then employed to study different patterns of inlet distortion. The results show a very good agreement between Unsteady Reynolds-Averaged Navier–Stokes (URANS) simulations and Body Force calculations in terms of performance, key quantities along the radial and circumferential directions and distortion transfer across the compressor.