Liquid Annular Seal CFD Analysis for Rotordynamic Force Prediction

A commercially available code is utilized to analyze a plain and grooved liquid annular seal. These type seals are commonly used in modern turbopumps and have a pronounced effect on the rotordynamic behavior of these systems. Accurate prediction of both leakage and dynamic reaction forces is vital to ensure good performance and sound mechanical operation. The code SCISEAL developed by CFDRC is a generic 3-D, finite volume based CFD code solving the 3-D Reynolds averaged Navier Stokes equations. The code allows body-fitted, multi-blocked structured grids, turbulence modeling, rotating coordinate frames, as well as integration of dynamic pressure and shear forces on the rotating journal. The code may be used with the commercially available pre-and post-processing codes from CFDRC as well.