Rapid low fidelity turbomachinery disk optimization

Turbomachinery disks are heavy, highly stressed components used in gas turbines. Improved design of turbomachinery disks could yield a significant reduction in engine weight. This paper focuses on rapid low fidelity design and optimization of isotropic and transversely isotropic disks. Discussion includes the development of a one dimensional plane stress model, disk parameterization methods, and the implementation of a genetic algorithm for shape optimization. Three traditional geometry definition methods are compared to two new methods that are described and produce more optimum designs. Hardware from the GE E is used as an example. The analysis code is open-source, graphical, interactive, and portable on Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X. 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.