Exploring automatic multi-objective turbine disc design for virtual engines

Abstract

Growing environmental concerns, high fuel prices and increased competition demand improved engineering of aircraft, aircraft engines and their components. Aero engines are produced by various risk-sharing partners and are often designed collaboratively. Consequently the virtual engine is a combination of the proprietary tool suites of each partner in a federation. This paper describes a (possible) realisation of such a virtual engine for a two stage high pressure turbine assembly. The obtained design results demonstrate the feasibility of the concept. Initial experience with this virtual engine suggests that more attention to the accuracy of the individual tools must be paid, before embarking on automated multi-objective optimisations.