Turbomachinery Similarities
Many types of dynamic continuous flow *turbomachinery are treated in Wikipedia. As stated in the main turbomachinery article, what is notable about turbomachinery is that the fundamentals apply almost universally. Certainly there are significant differences between these machines and between the types of analysis that are typically applied to specific cases. This does not negate that they are unified by the same underlying physics of fluid dynamics, gas dynamics, aerodynamics, hydrodynamics, and thermodynamics.
A few of these machines have physical characreristics related to the centrifucal compressor, such as the following;
| Similarities to axial compressor
Centrifugal compressors are similar to axial compressors in that they are rotating airfoil based compressors as shown in the adjacent figure. It should not be surprising that the first part of the centrifugal impeller looks very similar to an axial compressor. This first part of the centrifugal impeller is also termed an inducer. Centrifugal compressors differ from axials as they use a greater change in radius from inlet to exit of the rotor/impeller. |
| Similarities to centrifugal fan
Centrifugal compressors are also similar to centrifugal fans of the style shown in neighboring figure as they both increase the flows energy through increasing radius. In contrast to centrifugal fans, compressors operate at higher speeds to generate greater pressure rises. In many cases the engineering methods used to design a centrifugal fan is the same as those to design a centrifugal compressor. As a result they can at times look very similar. This relationship is less true in comparison to a squirrel-cage fans as shown in figure farthest right. For purposes of generalization and definition, it can be said that centrifugal compressors often have density increases greater than 5 percent. Also, they often experience relative fluid velocities above Mach number 0.3 when the working fluid is air or nitrogen. In contrast, fans or blowers are often considered to have density increases of less than 5 percent and peak relative fluid velocities below Mach 0.3. |
| Similarities to centrifugal pump
Centrifugal compressors are also similar to centrifugal pumps of the style shown in the adjacent figures. The key difference between such compressors and pumps is that the compressor working fluid is a gas (compressible) and the pump working fluid is liquid (incompressible). Again, the engineering methods used to design a centrifugal pump are the same as those to design a centrifugal compressor. Yet, there is one important difference: the need to deal with cavitation in pumps. |
| Similarities to radial turbine
Centrifugal compressors also look very similar to their turbomachinery counterpart the radial-inflow turbine as shown in the figure. While a compressor transfers energy into a flow to raise its pressure, a turbine operates in reverse, by extracting energy from a flow, thus reducing its pressure. In other words, power is input to compressors and output from turbines. |
Read more about this topic: Centrifugal Compressor
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