Effects of Reynolds number and tooth front angle on leakage loss and heat transfer characteristics in a rotating labyrinth seal

Abstract The labyrinth seal is effective in reducing leakage losses at the rotor blade top in the turbine. This study investigates the variation in labyrinth seal performance at different rotational speeds, different Reynolds numbers, and different tooth front angles. Three Reynolds numbers (Re = 6000, 10,000, 15,000), five rotational speeds (Ta/Re = 0, 0.01, 0.04, 0.08, and 0.1), and three tooth front angles(75 deg, 90 deg, and 102.4 deg) have been introduced. The variation of leakage losses and heat transfer under different conditions is compared and a detailed analysis of the flow field and energy losses is performed. The discharge coefficient is increased slightly with increased rotational speed for the same Reynolds number. This is caused by the high rotational speed reducing the throttling loss and vortex loss. The high rotational speed enhances the heat transfer at the tip wall of the passage, and also weakens the heat transfer at the tooth cavity bottom. Additionally, the sealing capacity of the labyrinth is better at large tooth front angles, which is caused by the reduction of frictional losses on the stator and eddy current losses in the tooth cavity. The change in local pressure loss also affects the velocity distribution along the channel, which is the reason for the change in the local Nusselt number.