Lifing Assessment of Gas Turbine Blade Root Affected by Out-of-Tolerances

Current and future heavy-duty gas turbines (GTs) are being developed as an alternative or support to renewable energy sources (RESs). Therefore, GTs are subjected to several instances of being switched on and off; thus, the material fatigue limit can be reached in a short time. In such a scenario, possible out-of-tolerances (OoTs) in critical components must be considered. In this paper, OoTs related to critical parameters in the attachment geometry of a rotor blade are considered to estimate their impact on component life through a 2D finite element (FE) analysis. First, a mesh refinement is performed to obtain mesh-independent results; second, OoT geometries are simulated to determine stresses and strains at the blade attachment and disc groove. The mesh refinement process is critical to ensure model accuracy for both nominal and OoT geometries. The results show that OoTs can lead to important reductions in the life of the intended component, both on the blade and disc sides. These results could be useful in updating the maintenance plan for components and could be used for future insights, with further work extending the study to 3D geometry, for example, and evaluating the effect of other geometries.