Investigations on cavitation suppression of bionic water-jet impeller

Abstract Bionic impeller blades can improve cavitation performance of waterjets. A Special kind of bionic impeller with non-smooth leading edge is designed to improve the NPSH (net positive suction head) performance of waterjets. Based on the cavitation experiment of the waterjet with original impeller, a reliable CFD method using the commercial software StarCCM+ is verified. The detailed flow field of the bionic blades is obtained by simulating the viscous flow field. The stream line, pressure distribution and vortex reveal the mechanism of bionic blades flow adjustment. The influence of bionic impeller factors, which are the amplitude, the interval and the phase, on cavitation performance is systematically studied. The area and volume of the blade cavitation pattern is used to characterize the blade cavitation performance. An efficient method of cavitation pattern recognition is proposed to determine the information of the blade cavitation pattern accurately. A feasible cavitation-adjustment method is proposed to improve the hydraulic performance by optimizing the cavitation distribution and strength.