Chairman

Ron van Gestel, Chromalloy, The Netherlands

Vision

To extend the ultimate life and repair interval for key hot section components by 30%.

Background

A major point of concern for most gas turbine users is the availability and reliability of their engines. Among other causes, such as controls, these issues depend strongly on the operation induced degradation of the key hot section components. These components include the turbine blades and vanes, together with the combustors. The target of the working group is to provide the industry with useful tool(s) to allow one to assess and predict the rate of degradation of these key components. This will be based upon quantitative measurements (including in-situ). Based upon this, guidelines will be provided for the specific engine/components. During this exercise, particular attention will be paid to the maintenance costs. The effects of repairs, any repair induced degradation as well as an extension of limits of repairability will also be addressed.

Research Areas

The main phases of a project will be:

• Identification of the engine availability and the reliability determining components
• Identification of the life limiting degradation models of the key gas turbine engine components
  • Development of measurement techniques to determine key parameters
  • Consequences of interaction of multiple degradation mechanisms on the life of a component
• Extension of the predictability of the key degradation mechanisms
  • Development of analytical tool(s)
• Consequences of repair processes on predictability
• Extension of the limits of repairability