Florida Institute of Technology
As a Performing Member for the University Turbine Systems Research Program (UTSR), Florida Institute of Technology has several experimental and computational facilities that will be made available for theUTSR Program—University Research.
Experimental Facilities and Capabilities
Low-Speed Wind Tunnel: This facility is situated in the Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering (MAE) Fluid Dynamics Laboratory. It is and open-circuit tunnel, with an inlet-flow management section consisting of a two-dimensional nozzle of 14-ti-1 contraction ratio, a honeycomb, and six 8 mesh/cm screens for reducing the inflow-turbulence levels. Two test sections, 0.535 m square cross section and 1.53 m long, are available, thereby minimizing the downtime for incorporating the needed changes in hardware and instrumentation. The wind is drawn through the tunnel by means of a five-bladed aluminum fan, which is driven by a 15 kW (20-hp) variable-frequency motor-drive and is capable of producing varying wind speeds up to 45 m/s in the test section. The drive is located at the downstream end of a diffuser of three degrees included angle. The maximum freestream turbulence intensity is less than 0.15 percent.
Wind-Tunnel Instrumentation: The instrumentation system associated with the tunnel includes a DANTEC single-component laser-Doppler anemometry (LDA) system for non-intrusive velocity measurements, a three-channel DANTEC 56C and a two-channel TSI 1050 thermal anemometry systems for velocity and temperature measurements, a two-axis external platform-type strain gage force-balance for aerodynamic force measurements, and a PSI 780 32-channel simultaneous pressure measurement systems. Most of the data acquisition and processing is done with a Mitsuba 12 MHx 80286 (IBM compatible) computer and an Omega A/D converter. A new 33 MHZ 80486 computer has been acquired recently to upgrade the data acquisition/processing.
Present DANTEC LDA system consists of a 12mW He-Ne laser, transmitting optics with a 55x51 310 mm focal length lens, and a X34 Photo Multiplier tube, which can be mounted in the forward- or back-scatter receiving mode. A DANTEC 55L90a counter processor is used for A/D conversion, signal conditioning, and Doppler-burst detections. The DANTEC enCOUNTER software is used for data-processing on an 80486 computer. This LDA system is used for measuring the velocity in water flows, with natural fluid contaminants providing the seeding. For measurements in air flows, the seeding is provided by 2 micron diameter microshperes of polystyrene latex doped in a mixture of water and ethyl alcohol sprayed into the airstream.
There are two TSI 1050 hot-wire anemometers for performing both single-wire and crossed-wire measurements. Appropriate signal conditioning units and linearizers complement this system. The velocity-and temperature-measurement capabilities have been greatly advanced by the recent acquisition of the DANTEC 56C thermal anemometry system consisting of two 56C17 CTA bridges, one 56C20 temperature bridge, and associated accessories.
Data-acquisition and –processing software is available for mean/fluctuating velocity and temperature measurements and for computing the Reynolds stress and heat flux. These include software developed in-house, as well as the extensive signal-analysis software developed by Data Ready, Inc.
Flow Visualization Capability: A Magnum 1600 Fog Generator is available for flow visualization and for LDA flow-seeding in the wind tunnel. It can produce a continuous supply of fog at varying flow rates. A major enhancement of the flow-visualization capability is due to the Laser Illumination/Streak Photography Facility, which consists of a 10 mW He-Ne Spectra-Physics laser, Nikon FM2 35 mm reflex camera with Bogen tripod, and a Nikon 105 mm micro lens. Both qualitative mapping of the velocity field in low-speed gas and liquid flows, and approximate quantitative measurements of velocity with time lapse/streak photography are possible with this facility
Composite Materials and Structures Laboratory: The experimental facilities for composite materials include testing for tension, compression, impact, vibration, and shock, as well as image, x-ray, and scanning electron microscope processing. The experimental capabilities focus on characterizing the mechanical behavior of composite materials, and more broadly, understanding many of the aspects related to the design and manufacture of composite structures. Computational capabilities focus on the development of models for making design-life predictions and damage-tolerant designs.
Systems and Dynamics Laboratory: The experimental facilities include a vibration test system, impact hammers, function generators, signal processors, microcomputers, and data-acquisition systems. Research capabilities encompass vibration and flutter studies in bladed-disk assemblies, machinery monitoring and diagnostics, and the dynamics of elastic composites and flexible multibody systems.
Computational Facilities and Capabilities
The computing facilities of the College of Engineering include a VAX-11/780-VAX 8200 network, running the VMS operating system; a Harris HCX-9, running the UNIX System V operating system; and a MicroVAX II, running the ULTRIX operating system. The MAE Computer-Aided Design Laboratory has five Hewlett-Packard Vectra microcomputers and peripherals. Computational facilities for research in composites and structures include a SUN Sparc 10 (86 MIPS) workstation with 48 Mb RAM and 2.5 Gb hard disk, two Macintosh LC III microcomputers, and one MacCentric 650 microcomputer. The major computing resource for large-scale scientific computations in fluid dynamics and heat transfer is the MAE Center for Computational Fluid Dynamics (CCFD).
Center for Computational Fluid Dynamics: The centerpiece of this facility is the Ardent TITAN II Graphics Supercomputer, to which are connected three SUN workstations and several peripherals.
The TITAN II is a graphics supercomputer with high-performance high-resolution graphics. It has two processors, each containing an integer unit and a vector unit. Peak performance ratings are 16 MIPS for the integer processor and 16 MFLOPS for the vector processor. The peak hardware Gouraud shading rate for processing graphics is 50 million pixels per second and the peak hardware drawing rate is 11.6 million pixels per second. As a 64-bit supercomputer, the TITAN II compares well with the much more expensive CRAy X/MP: The clock speed of TITAN with 2 processors is 62.5 ns, whereas that of CRAY X/MP with 4 processors is 8.5 ns. The respective (sustained) MIPS are 10 and 20. The greatest appeal of TITAN to AGTSR is that it is a dedicated MAE facility.
The capabilities for computational research include computational fluid dynamics (CFD) involving the development, operation, and validation of time-averaged and time-dependent Navier-Stokes cods; computational heat transfer involving radiative transport in participating media, forced-convection heat transfer, and mixed-mode heat transfer; hybrid computation, which involves the application in tandem of the global CFD techniques of detailed computing with the local modular modeling and asymptotic analysis; and turbulence modeling, sensitivity analysis and inverse-problem methodologies. |