A High-Fidelity Software Tool for Gas Turbine Engine Noise Prediction Navy SBIR FY2005.2 Sol No.: Navy SBIR FY2005.2 Topic No.: N05-088 Topic Title: A High-Fidelity Software Tool for Gas Turbine Engine Noise Prediction Proposal No.: N052-088-0542 Firm: Thaerocomp Technical Corporation P. O. Box 1527 Stony Brook, New York 11790-0609 Contact: Ken Alabi Phone: (800) 490-1004 Web Site: www.thaerocomp.com Abstract: Aerodynamically-generated noise from aircraft is a critical factor in the continuing development of aviation, as community noise concerns and the associated regulatory requirements constrain the design of new airplanes. In particular, supersonic jets are known to produce broadband and narrow-band (screech tones) noise, which contributes to structural fatigue, in addition to the strong environmental noise pollution. The ability to accurately predict noise mechanisms in gas turbine engines will therefore constitute an essential component of any program aimed at producing aircraft engines with low jet noise emissions. Thaerocomp Technical Corp. (TTC) is proposing to develop a high-fidelity CFD-based software tool for accurate, affordable, and reliable prediction of jet noise at all speeds (subsonic, transonic, supersonic, and hypersonic) under realistic flight conditions. The bottlenecks that currently prevent the availability of such a tool are identified and the innovative research required to remove them are proposed. The proposed tool considerably simplifies the procedure of specifying boundary conditions and suggests a better way to calculate turbulence-generated noise. The new procedure will also identify the best approach to compute the propagation of noise far-field from the point of generation. One of the objectives of the proposed research is to obtain highly accurate noise prediction results for high speed jets. Procedures to establish the feasibility of the Phase I research are proposed. Benefits: The software tool proposed by Thaerocomp Technical Corporation (TTC) represents a new capability which engine and aircraft manufacturers do not currently have. It will prove useful for achieving a competitive edge. The Department of Defense, NASA, and other government agencies that use aerospace technology will also benefit significantly from this innovative TTC product, since it will provide them with the tool to screen new designs early in the design process. The proposed product will interface with government and commercial computational fluid dynamics (CFD) codes in order to obtain jet noise prediction data. It will be available to the Navy as a standalone tool and will add value to CFD codes. This will make this product attractive to CFD vendors who will find it cheaper to plug TTC's tool into their own CFD software packages rather than develop the capability from scratch. Finally, the product is expected to bring more consulting activity, thus increasing the profitability of numerous consulting firms that use CFD technology in their business. Return