Turbomachinery Laboratory, Texas A&M Engineering Experiment Station
Abstract
LecturesSubsynchronous shaft vibration was observed in an integrally
geared expander-compressor when the machine was operated
with a partial load in the course of plant start up. The root
cause of the synchronous shaft vibration was identified, by
means of CFD analysis, as the vortex flow which was
generated in the downstream piping of the gas expander
wheel.
OEM installed an object, called “vortex breaker”, in the piping
in order to eliminate the excitation force of the vortex flow,
and as the result, the subsynchronous shaft vibration
disappeared.
This paper provides the detailed shaft vibration data, root
cause analysis, countermeasure and the result from the
countermeasure
