A COMPOSITE TURBINE BLADE OPTIMIZATION FOR MAXIMUM STRENGTH

Prediction of strength characteristics of a composite structure depend s upon a large number of parameters including ply orientation, ply thi ckness, stacking sequence and geometry. Analytical solutions alone are not sufficient for practical design considerations. In this work, an effective application of a numerical optimization method has been demo nstrated for the design of a turbine blade, rotating at a constant ang ular velocity. The analytical blade model used in the optimization is based on the free-edge stress observations for large width-to-thicknes s composite configuration. Ply strength ratios were selected as the ob jective functions and ply orientations were chosen as the design varia bles. Maximum stress and quadratic failure criteria were satisfied at multiple cross-sections to obtain the optimum design.