Aerospace Science and Technology 105 (2020) 105997

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Aerospace Science and Technology

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Spiral flow induced destabilizing force analysis and its reduction with
a novel helix-comb gas seal
Mingjie Zhang, Jiangang Yang ∗
National Engineering Research Center of Turbogenerator Vibration, School of Energy and Environment, Southeast University, Nanjing 210096, Jiangsu Province,
China

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: The circumferential spiral flow is the main cause of destabilizing tangential force. To control the
Received 15 January 2020 circumferential spiral flow, the helix-comb seal is presented in this study. With the guiding role of
Received in revised form 26 April 2020 helical teeth, the negative circumferential spiral flow can be generated. It can significantly suppress
Accepted 8 June 2020
the circumferential flow within the seal gap. A 3D computational fluid dynamics method is employed
Available online 16 June 2020
Communicated by Xinqian Zheng
to investigate the performance of helix-comb seal. From the parameter analysis, it is found that the
minimum tangential force can be obtained with the helix angle of 15 deg. Tangential force decreases
Keywords: with the increasing helical tooth number and helical tooth height. Considering the rubbing between the
Helix-comb seal helical teeth and rotor, helical tooth height should be slightly smaller than the height of its adjacent
Circumferential spiral flow comb tooth. Comparisons are conducted between the labyrinth seal (with and without swirl brakes) and
Tangential force helix-comb seal. Results reveal that the three seals have a comparable sealing performance. Considering
Leakage the destabilizing force, the helix-comb seal has the lowest tangential force and the best stability. The
Computational fluid dynamics
helix-comb seal provides a novel method to control self-excited vibration.
© 2020 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction considerably. However, LS has also been considered as the primary

Annular gas seals in aero-engines are necessary components
that are used to control the leakage flow through rotor-stator
clearances from high pressure regions to low pressure regions. Its
performance determines the output power and efficiency of gas
turbines [1,2]. The total pressure and efficiency both decline as
gap leakage increases in an axial compressor stage [3]. The flow
through the seals also generates fluid-induced forces on the ro-
tor [4,5], which affects the dynamic properties of the rotor and
may lead to rotor instability. In recent years, the demand for more
powerful and efficient turbomachines leads to higher operating pa-
rameters and tighter sealing clearance. The problem of unstable
vibrations due to seal fluid-induced forces becomes more serious
[6–8]. Modern seal technology puts forward higher requirements
in reducing leakage and fluid-induced forces simultaneously.
Labyrinth seal (LS) (Fig. 1(a)) [9] is the most common type
of seal due to its desirable leakage prevention characteristics and
non-contacting nature, which allows rotor speeds to be increased
* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: jgyang@seu.edu.cn (J. Yang).
cause of rotordynamic instabilities. Unstable vibration induced by
LS was first pointed out by Alford [10], and after that it has
been studied by many investigators. Test results by Benckert and
Wachter [11] showed that circumferential spiral flow induced the
destabilizing tangential force represented by cross-coupled stiff-
ness. This is because the flow through LS is imparted to a circum-
ferential velocity in the rotational direction due to the preswirl and
rotor spinning. Strong circumferential flow gives rise to asymmetric
pressure distribution. The maximum pressure lags the minimum
gap in the rotational direction. The tangential component of the
pressure force is in the same direction as the rotor velocity. The
tangential force can drive the rotordynamic instability. Controlling
the circumferential spiral flow is a direct and effective means to
reduce the destabilizing tangential force. For this purpose, shunt
injection technology [12] was proposed.
Shunt injection (Fig. 1(b)) is an effective approach to enhance
rotor stability by eliminating the circumferential flow near the high
pressure end of the seal. It has been successfully utilized to elim-
inate subsynchronous vibration in centrifugal compressors [13].
High-pressure gas is injected into the leading portion of LS in the
radial direction or with an angle against the rotational direction.
The circumferential flow inside the seal is broken up, and even
the flow direction is changed by the injected gas. The experimen-
tal data [13] demonstrated that LS with shunt injection was better
able to control rotordynamic instabilities than LS without shunt in-

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ast.2020.105997
1270-9638/© 2020 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.
2 M. Zhang, J. Yang / Aerospace Science and Technology 105 (2020) 105997
Nomenclature
Cr Comb tooth clearance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . mm
e Eccentricity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . mm
Ft Tangential force . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . N
h1 Cavity depth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . mm
h2 Vane height . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . mm
h3 Helical tooth height . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . mm
k Cross-coupled stiffness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . N/m
l1 Vane length . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . mm
l2 Distance between vane and seal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . mm
n1 Number of comb teeth
n2 Number of vanes
n3 Number of helical teeth (each cavity)
Pi Inlet pressure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . MPa
Po Outlet pressure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . MPa
P Pressure difference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . MPa
R Seal inner radius . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . mm
T Inlet temperature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . K
w1 Cavity width . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . mm
Fig. 1. LS and two typical seals for circumferential spiral flow control.
jection. Kim [14] employed the CFD perturbation model to predict
the effects of shunt injection on the rotordynamics of LS. Predicted
results revealed that drastically reduced (negative) cross-coupled
stiffness could be obtained with the use of shunt injection. The dis-
advantage of shunt injection is the performance penalty involved
in diverting flow from compressor discharge and recirculating it
through the machine [13]. The use of shunt injection can result in
a large leakage increase [13]. In addition, the shunt line from the
discharge volute to the seal front section should be designed and
installed carefully to assure the pressure drop across the shunt line
is minimized [15]. These restrict the further application of shunt
injection. Swirl brakes [16] is one promising alternative of shunt
injection to control the circumferential spiral flow.
w2 Comb tooth width . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . mm
w3 Vane width . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . mm
w4 Helical tooth width . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . mm
ω Rotational speed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . rpm
γ Helix angle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . deg
λ Inlet preswirl ratio
Subscripts
i Inlet
o Outlet
r Radial direction
t Tangential direction
1, 2, . . . , 5 Custom order
Abbreviations
CFD Computational fluid dynamics
HCS Helix-comb seal
LS Labyrinth seal
Swirl brakes (Fig. 1(c)) are a series of vanes provided at seal en-
trance to impede or direct the circumferential flow to reduce the
destabilizing tangential force and cross-coupled stiffness. Wachter
and Benckert [11] demonstrated the effectiveness of swirl brakes in
reducing the destabilizing tangential force. Nielsen [17] addressed
swirl brakes design and flow structure description. It was shown
that the three-dimensional vortical structure of the flows could be
efficiently used to reduce the swirl at seal inlet. In order to in-
vert the circumferential direction of inlet flow, the “negative-swirl”
brakes [18] were invented. Investigations showed that the swirl
brakes reduced destabilizing cross-coupled stiffness by a factor
of 0.8, and the negative-swirl brakes changed the sign of cross-
coupled stiffness at an appreciable magnitude [18]. The deswirl
effect of swirl brakes is sometimes limited due to their location
away from seal entrance. The implantation of swirl brakes would
change the flow pattern behind the final stage impeller backwall
[15]. Hence, further researches are needed to limit the circumfer-
ential flow more effectively.
Helically grooved seals [19] have been proposed as a means of
achieving greater reduction in leakage. The sealing mechanism is
the pumping effect [20], by which working fluid is pushed back
toward the higher-pressure side along the helical grooves by the
spinning motion of rotor. The pumping effect increases with rota-
tional speed and fluid viscosity [21]. Helically grooved seals have
been widely used as liquid seals [19,20]. Zero leakage can be ob-
tained because of the significant pumping effect with high liquid
viscosity. For gas seals, the gas viscosity is so small that the pump-
ing effect is not obvious. The larger flow passage cross-sectional
area of the grooves results in an increase of leakage flow rate
[22]. This disadvantage restricts its application in gas seal field.
However, the helical groove concept can be used to control the
destabilizing circumferential spiral flow.
This study proposes a new kind of helix-comb seal (HCS) to
control the circumferential spiral flow and tangential force. With
the guiding role, the helical teeth are designed to generate the
negative circumferential spiral flow inside the seal cavities. The
circumferential velocity within the seal gap is reduced substan-
tially. The tangential force is also significantly reduced. To study
the dependency of the seal performance on the structure param-
eters, three major parameters are investigated including helical
tooth number, helical tooth height, and helix angle. To evaluate
and demonstrate the effectiveness of HCS in leakage control and
 M. Zhang, J. Yang / Aerospace Science and Technology 105 (2020) 105997 3

Fig. 2. Sketch of helix-comb seal.

Fig. 3. Geometries of three types of seals.

tangential force reduction, comparisons between the LS (with and
without swirl brakes) and HCS are conducted.
2. Helix-comb seal for circumferential spiral flow control
For the LS, the circumferential spiral flow is dominant for the
destabilizing tangential force. Retarding circumferential velocity is
a direct and effective means to reduce the destabilizing tangen-
tial force. Inspired by the helical groove concept, HCS is proposed.
With the guiding role of helical teeth, the fluid moves along the
helical grooves. If the helix angle is set to oppose the rotational di-
rection, the direction of groove flow becomes the opposite to that
of rotor spinning motion. The circumferential flow within the seal
gap is weakened by the groove flow. The destabilizing tangential
force is reduced.
Fig. 2 shows the specific structure of HCS. The tooth-on-stator
configuration is used. Several helical teeth are inserted equally
spaced around the circumferential in the annular cavities com-
posed of comb teeth. Each annular cavity is divided into isolate
helical grooves of equal angular size. The helix direction is set
to oppose the rotational direction of the rotor with the goal of
generating the negative circumferential spiral flow inside the heli-
cal grooves. In order to avoid the rubbing between the rotor and
helical teeth, the helical tooth height is smaller than comb tooth
height.
3. Numerical approach
3.1. Seal model
The LS, LS with swirl brakes, and HCS are used for CFD com-
parison analysis in this study. Fig. 3 shows the seal geometries of
the three seals. The LS has four rectangular comb teeth on the
stator and a smooth rotor. For the LS with swirl brakes, a series
of vanes are placed at the entrance of LS. For the HCS, the spe-
cially designed helical teeth are inserted equally spaced around
the circumferential in the annular cavities of LS. In order to have a
straightforward comparison, the three seals share the same comb
4 M. Zhang, J. Yang / Aerospace Science and Technology 105 (2020) 105997

Table 1 Table 2
Seal dimensions. Operating and boundary conditions.

Seals LS LS with swirl HCS Properties Value

brakes
Inlet pressure, P i /MPa 0.6
Seal inner radius, R/mm 90 90 90 Outlet pressure, P o /MPa 0.30, 0.35, 0.40, 0.45, 0.50
Comb tooth clearance, C r /mm 0.3 0.3 0.3 Pressure difference,  P = P i − P o /MPa 0.10, 0.15, 0.20, 0.25, 0.30
Cavity depth, h1 /mm 3.5 3.5 3.5 Inlet temperature, T /K 300
Cavity width, w 1 /mm 17.5 17.5 17.5 Rotational speed, ω/rpm 6000
Comb tooth width, w 2 /mm 0.3 0.3 0.3 Inlet preswirl ratio, λ 0, 0.20, 0.40, 0.60, 0.80, 1
Number of comb teeth, n1 4 4 4
Number of vanes, n2 / 40 /
Vane height, h2 /mm / 3.45 / preswirl motion for the working fluid. Take the LS as an example,
Vane length, l1 /mm / 3.5 / Fig. 6 shows the circumferential flow velocity vectors for the LS
Vane width, w 3 /mm / 1.0 /
Distance between vane and / 1.5 /
with and without FAN boundary. Without the FAN boundary, only
seal, l2 /mm the fluid near the rotor has the significant circumferential flow.
Number of helical teeth (each / / 0, 4, 8 With the FAN boundary, all the fluid exhibits the strong circumfer-
cavity), n3 ential flow. The preswirl motion of working fluid can be reasonably
Helical tooth width, w 4 /mm / / 0.3
simulated using the FAN boundary. The preswirl ratio is defined as
Helical tooth height, h3 /mm / / 3.40, 3.45, 3.50
Helix angle, γ /deg / / 5, 10, 15, 20, 25 the ratio of the inlet circumferential velocity of the fluid to the
Eccentricity, e/mm 0.15 0.15 0.15 rotor surface velocity.
Eccentricity ratio 0.50 0.50 0.50
3.3. Numerical model

The ANSYS FLUENT software is used in the CFD analysis. It

Fig. 4. Axial view of an eccentric rotor.
tooth structure, comb tooth clearance, rotor diameter, cavity depth,
cavity width, and comb tooth number. To avoid the rubbing be-
tween the swirl brakes/helical teeth and rotor, the radial clearances
at helical teeth and swirl brakes are larger than that of comb teeth.
The detailed dimensions are listed in Table 1. As shown in Fig. 4,
the eccentric direction of the rotor is along the positive direction
of the Y -axis. The tangential force is a positive value when it is in
the same direction as the rotor velocity. Conversely the tangential
force is a negative value when the force and rotor velocity are in
opposite direction.
3.2. Operating and boundary conditions
Detailed operating conditions for CFD calculations are listed
in Table 2. Fig. 5 shows the computational domains of the three
seals. Total pressure and temperature are defined for the seal inlet
boundary, whereas the static pressure is set up at the seal out-
let. The walls of rotor and stator are defined to be nonslip. FAN
boundary is used to provide preswirl velocity for the working fluid
[23]. The FAN model is a lumped parameter model. It can be used
to specify tangential velocity field on the fan surface to generate
utilizes a pressure-based solver, which employs the finite-volume-
based method to solve the equations for conservation of mass,
momentum, and energy using SIMPLE pressure-velocity coupling
algorithm. This calculation assumes the fluid to be an ideal gas
and the entire flow to be turbulent. The k–ε turbulence model is
applied because it can meet the requirements of excellent stabil-
ity and good accuracy, and a large number of its numerical results
exhibit good agreement with the experiment results [24–27]. The
scalable wall function method combines the physical quantity of
the wall and the high-level turbulent zone. Scalable wall functions
avoid the deterioration of standard wall functions under grid re-
finement below y∗ < 1.1. These wall functions produce consistent
results for grids of arbitrary refinement.
Fig. 7 shows the meshes of the three seals. Due to the cir-
cumferentially non-uniform flow pattern and fluid-induced forces
inside the annular seals, full 360 deg computational models and
meshes are required. In order to ensure fully developed flow condi-
tions, the upstream and downstream cavities are axially extended.
In order to determine how fine a mesh density is necessary
to accurately predict the seal performance, a mesh independence
study is performed for the three seals. Only taking the leakage flow
rate as the measure to verify mesh independence is not sufficient.
The tangential force F t is included to select an appropriate mesh.
The test is performed with a rotational speed of 6000 rpm, in-
let pressure of 0.6 MPa, outlet pressure of 0.3 MPa and zero inlet
preswirl. As shown in Fig. 8, the test includes incremental adjust-
ments to grid size until the leakage and tangential force results
are independent. The final sizes of mesh for the LS, LS with swirl
brakes, and HCS are 1.37 × 106 nodes, 5.35 × 106 nodes, and 6.25
× 106 nodes, respectively. Very fine mesh layers are placed over
the rotor and stator surfaces to catch the rotation and wall effects.
The y+ values are controlled within 200, which is acceptable for
the wall function in this study.
3.4. Numerical method validation
In order to verify the accuracy and reliability of the three-
dimensional CFD method, the leakage flow rate and tangential
force of the LS are calculated using CFD method and compared
with the experimental data [28]. The experimental data gives the
cross-coupled stiffness instead of the tangential force. Without ro-
tor whirl motion, the relationship between the tangential force and
cross-coupled stiffness is [29]
 M. Zhang, J. Yang / Aerospace Science and Technology 105 (2020) 105997
Fig. 5. Computational domains of three types of seals.
Ft
k=
e
where k is the cross-coupled stiffness, F t is the tangential force,
and e is the eccentricity.
Fig. 9 compares the calculated leakage flow rate with experi-
mental results. Both the calculated leakage flow rate and the mea-
sured reach their maximum at zero entry swirl. The maximum
difference of leakage flow rate is less than 9%. Fig. 10 compares
the calculated cross-coupled stiffness with experimental results.
The cross-coupled stiffness is well predicted. The numerical results
capture the correct preswirl dependence of cross-coupled stiffness.
The cross-coupled stiffness increases almost linearly with the in-
creasing preswirl velocity. The prediction difference is due to that
uniform velocity and pressure boundary conditions used in CFD
analysis, which is not consistent with the practical non-uniform in
the experiments.
Due to that the detailed static pressure distribution was not
reported in the reference [28], another example of [30] with the
measured static pressure was adopted. The static pressure distri-
bution of the CFD method was compared with the experimental
data, as shown in Fig. 11. The calculated static pressure distribu-
tion and the measured decrease along the axial flow direction. The
maximum difference is less than 3.2%. The CFD results show a good
agreement with the experimental data.
In general, the present CFD method has reasonable accuracy to
predict the static pressure distribution, leakage flow rate, and tan-
gential force of annular gas seals.
5
(1) 4. Results and discussion
4.1. Flow field analysis of helix-comb seal
The major feature of HCS is that the helical teeth are used to
divide the annular cavities into several smaller helical grooves. The
flow field in this section is the key to understand the working
mechanisms of HCS. For comparison, the flow field results of LS
are also plotted. The results are obtained for an operating con-
dition with a rotational speed of 6000 rpm, inlet pressure of 0.6
MPa, outlet pressure of 0.3 MPa, and high preswirl (λ = 1). For
the HCS, the helical tooth number (each cavity) is 8, the helical
tooth height is 3.45 mm, and the helix angle is 15 deg. Fig. 12
depicts the contours of velocity for the LS and HCS. The velocity
vectors in the second cavity of the two seals are also plotted in
Fig. 13. Working fluid is accelerated at the first comb tooth tip be-
cause the flow area suddenly contracted at the small clearance. A
part of the pressure energy is transformed into kinetic energy. The
high-speed jet drives a large vortex inside the subsequent chamber
because of the viscous force between the jet and cavity flows. As
a result, the kinetic energy is dissipated into heat. For the LS, the
high-speed jet passes through the next comb tooth and repeats the
previous process. For the HCS, a high-speed jet is observed at comb
tooth tip. The downstream helical tooth clearance faces a straight
jet impingement escaping from the previous comb tooth clearance.
An additional flow contraction occurs at the helical tooth tip. The
contraction effect is not obvious at helical tooth tip because the
helical tooth clearance is larger than comb tooth clearance. Af-
6 M. Zhang, J. Yang / Aerospace Science and Technology 105 (2020) 105997
Fig. 6. Circumferential flow velocity vectors for the LS with and without FAN bound-
ary.
ter the helical tooth, the second vortex zone occurs. Then the jet
passes through the next comb tooth and repeats the previous pro-
cess. Compared with LS, which has only one recirculation zone,
HCS has a twin vortex pattern in its cavity.
The throttling process across each seal tooth and the kinetic
energy dissipation within the subsequent chamber lead to the de-
crease in pressure. Pressure gradually drops from the first to the
last tooth, as shown in Fig. 14. The change of cavity pressure is
not significant when the jet flows through helical tooth tip. The
pressures in the chambers on both sides of a helical tooth are al-
most equal. The pressure drop mainly occurs at comb tooth tip.
It confirms that the helical teeth do not play the effective role in
throttling process. Comb teeth play the key role in sealing gas.
Fig. 15 shows the streamlines traveling through the LS and HCS.
The streamlines start from a position near the first comb tooth. For
the LS, circumferential spiral flow occurs inside annular cavity. It
is driven by the viscous shear stress due to rotor rotation. The cav-
ity flow and gap flow have the same circumferential flow direction.
For the HCS, the flow inside helical grooves is guided by the helical
teeth. The groove flow and gap flow have opposite circumferential
flow direction because the helix angle is set to oppose the rota-
tional direction. The groove flow can weaken the circumferential
flow within the seal gap.
In Fig. 15(a) and Fig. 15(b), the red dotted lines are parallel to
the rotation axis. For the LS, the angles between dotted lines and
streamlines are similar in each cavity. This means that the circum-
ferential displacements of streamlines within the LS are similar
in each cavity. For the HCS, the angle between dotted line and
streamlines decreases along the axial flow direction. The circum-
ferential displacements of streamlines in the latter cavities are
smaller than that in the first cavity. This phenomenon demon-
strates the effectiveness of negative spiral flow in limiting the cir-
cumferential flow within the seal gap. To quantitatively study the
development of circumferential velocity from the seal inlet to the
outlet, Fig. 16 shows the average circumferential velocity distribu-
Fig. 7. Meshes of three types of seals.
tion along the axial direction. In this picture, the four calculating
points locate at comb teeth clearance. The average circumferential
velocities of both seals decrease along the axial direction. For the
LS, this decrease is because the circumferential velocity is high at
high preswirl, the shear stress exerted by stator is larger than that
exerted by rotor, the net effect is to slow the circumferential veloc-
ity. For the HCS, the negative spiral flow inside the helical grooves
significantly increase the circumferential flow resistance. As a re-
sult, the descending rate of average circumferential velocity of HCS
is larger than that of LS. At seal outlet, the average circumferential
velocity of HCS is less than 1 m/s, the ratio of average circumfer-
ential velocity to the rotor surface velocity is less than 0.005.
4.2. Structure parameter analysis of helix-comb seal
The flow field inside HCS is complex due to the existence of
helical teeth. Helical teeth determine the flow pattern and seal
performance of HCS. Before going into details of performance com-
parisons with the other seals, it is needed for HCS to study the de-
pendency of seal performance on the structure parameters. Three
major parameters are investigated including helical tooth number,
helical tooth height, and helix angle.
4.2.1. Helical tooth number
In each annular cavity, three values of helical tooth number are
considered, corresponding to 0, 4, and 8 helical teeth. Except for
the helical tooth number, the helical tooth height is 3.45 mm and
 M. Zhang, J. Yang / Aerospace Science and Technology 105 (2020) 105997 7

Fig. 8. Mesh independence study of leakage and tangential force.

Fig. 11. Comparison of the calculated static pressure distribution with the measured.
Fig. 9. Comparison of the calculated leakage flow rate with the measured.

the helix angle is 15 deg. Table 3 shows the variation in leakage

Fig. 10. Comparison of the calculated cross-coupled stiffness with the measured.
flow rate with helical tooth number. The influence of helical tooth
number on leakage flow rate is less than 2.05%. Fig. 17 gives the
influence of helical tooth number on tangential force. Tangential
force is sensitive to the helical tooth number. The tangential force
decreases with the increase in helical tooth number. For the case
of 0 helical tooth, the seal configuration is the conventional LS and
its tangential force takes the maximum value. When the helical
teeth are inserted into annular cavities, the tangential force is re-
duced. This is because the circumferential flow within the seal gap
is weakened by the negative circumferential spiral flow inside he-
lical grooves. As helical tooth number increases from 4 to 8, the
tangential force decreases continuously because more helical teeth
can enhance the generation of negative circumferential spiral flow.
In this study, 8 helical teeth (each cavity) are selected.
8 M. Zhang, J. Yang / Aerospace Science and Technology 105 (2020) 105997

Fig. 12. Contours of velocity. (For interpretation of the colors in the figure(s), the Fig. 14. Contours of static pressure.
reader is referred to the web version of this article.)

Table 4
Variation in leakage flow rate with helical tooth height.

Helical tooth Leakage flow Difference

height (mm) rate (kg/s) (%)
3.40 0.11438 /
3.45 0.11378 0.52
3.50 0.11306 1.15

4.2.2. Helical tooth height

Due to that the helical tooth height cannot be larger than the
height of its adjacent comb tooth. The maximum helical tooth
height is 3.5 mm. Three helical tooth heights are calculated for
HCS, corresponding to 3.40 mm, 3.45 mm, and 3.50 mm. Except
for the helical tooth height, the helical tooth number (each cavity)
is 4 and the helix angle is 15 deg. Table 4 shows the variation in
leakage flow rate with helical tooth height. The influence of helical
tooth height on leakage flow rate is less than 1.15%. Fig. 18 shows
the variation in tangential force with helical tooth height. As the
helical tooth height increases, the tangential force decreases. With
the increase in helical tooth height, the less fluid undergoes cir-
cumferential flow due to rotor spinning motion, while the more
fluid is guided by helical teeth to generate negative circumferen-
tial spiral flow. The effect of negative spiral flow in limiting the
circumferential flow within the seal gap is enhanced. Considering
the rubbing between the helical teeth and rotor, a slightly smaller
height (3.45 mm) is selected.

4.2.3. Helix angle

Helix angle is the dominant parameter in determining the guid-
ing role of helical teeth. Five helix angles are calculated for HCS,
corresponding to 5 deg, 10 deg, 15 deg, 20 deg, and 25 deg. Ex-
Fig. 13. Velocity vectors. cept for the helix angle, the helical tooth number (each cavity) is 8
and the helical tooth height is 3.45 mm. Fig. 19 shows the variation
in leakage flow rate with helix angle. Leakage flow rate decreases
with increasing helix angle. When the helix angle is larger than 10
deg, the change of leakage flow rate with helix angle is small.
Table 3 When the helix angle is 0 deg, the helical teeth become circum-
Variation in leakage flow rate with helical tooth number.
ferential teeth. When the helix angle is 90 deg, the helical teeth
Helical tooth number Leakage flow rate Difference become axial baffles. In these two cases, the guiding role of helical
(each cavity), n2 (kg/s) (%)
teeth and negative circumferential spiral flow disappear. There-
0 0.11473 / fore, at least one optimum helix angle with which the HCS gets
4 0.11378 0.83
the lowest tangential force ought to exist. The tangential forces of
8 0.11708 2.05
five seals with different helix angles are shown in Fig. 20. As the
 M. Zhang, J. Yang / Aerospace Science and Technology 105 (2020) 105997 9

Fig. 15. Streamlines traveling through LS and HCS.

Fig. 16. Average circumferential velocity along the axial direction. Fig. 17. Variation in tangential force with helical tooth number ( P = 0.3 MPa, ω=
6000 rpm, λ = 0).

helix angle increases from 5 deg to 15 deg, the tangential force de-
creases, but as the helix angle continues to increase from 15 deg
to 25 deg, the tangential force begins to increase. 15 deg is the op-
timum helix angle for the HCS to gain the lowest tangential force.
4.3. Performance comparisons of three types of seals
After the parameter analysis of HCS, the HCS with helical tooth
number (each cavity) of 8, helical tooth height of 3.45 mm, and
helix angle of 15 deg is selected to conduct performance compar-
isons with the conventional LS and LS with swirl brakes.
4.3.1. Leakage
Fig. 21 compares the leakage flow rates for the three seals with
respect to the pressure difference across the seal. As the pressure
difference increases, the leakage flow rate shows a tendency to in-
crease. The maximum difference of leakage flow rate between the
HCS and LS is less than 1.35%. The maximum difference of leakage
flow rate among the three seals is less than 2.5%. These three seals
have the similar leakage flow rates.
The flow through the annular seal can be considered as a series
of throttling process. The seal tooth number is the key parameter
10 M. Zhang, J. Yang / Aerospace Science and Technology 105 (2020) 105997

Fig. 18. Variation in tangential force with helical tooth height ( P = 0.3 MPa, ω=
6000 rpm, λ = 0).

Fig. 22. Effect of tangential force on rotor stability.

Fig. 19. Variation in leakage flow rate with helix angle ( P = 0.3 MPa, ω = 6000
rpm, λ = 0).

Fig. 23. Variation in tangential force with pressure difference (ω = 6000 rpm, λ = 1).
Fig. 20. Variation in tangential force with helix angle ( P = 0.3 MPa, ω = 6000
rpm, λ = 0).

Fig. 21. Variation in leakage flow rate with pressure difference (ω = 6000 rpm, λ = Fig. 24. Variation in tangential force with preswirl ratio (ω = 6000 rpm,  P = 0.3
1). MPa).
 M. Zhang, J. Yang / Aerospace Science and Technology 105 (2020) 105997
Fig. 25. Circumferential pressure distribution in the middle of the second cavity (ω = 6000 rpm,  P = 0.3 MPa, λ = 1).
in determining the leakage flow rate. For the HCS, the helical teeth
do not play a role in throttling process. The effective tooth number
of HCS is the same as that of other two seals. Thus, the three seals
have a comparable sealing performance.
4.3.2. Tangential force
Tangential force is the cause of rotor instability. As shown in
Fig. 22, tangential force is orthogonal to the displacement. When
the tangential force is in the same direction as rotor velocity, the
tangential force is a positive value. The positive tangential force
tends to destabilize the rotor because it adds energy to the for-
ward whirl motion of the rotor. Conversely the tangential force
is a negative value when the force and the rotor velocity are in
opposite direction. The negative tangential force tends to stabilize
the rotor because it acts to remove energy from the forward whirl
motion of the rotor. The tangential force should have a low or neg-
ative value to keep the seal system stable. Fig. 23 compares the
tangential forces for the three seals with respect to the pressure
difference across the seal. With the increase of pressure difference,
the absolute value of tangential force increases. The HCS has the
lowest tangential force. The tangential force of HCS decreases by
236–620% relative to the conventional LS. The application of swirl
brakes can decrease the tangential force by 64–113% compared
with the LS. The difference between the HCS and LS is about 2–10
times as strong as that between the LS with swirl brakes and LS.
The HCS is better to reduce the tangential force compared with
swirl brakes. Note that the differences in tangential force between
the HCS and other seals increase with the pressure difference. The
HCS performs more efficient in reducing tangential force with high
pressure difference.
Fig. 24 shows the variation in tangential force with preswirl ra-
tio. Increasing preswirl ratio increases the tangential force. At high
preswirl, the tangential force of HCS is negative while the tangen-
tial forces of the other seals are positive. The negative tangential
11
force of HCS is desirable because it can stabilize the rotor system.
The HCS has the excellent ability to strengthen the rotor stability.
The tangential force originates from the non-uniform circumfer-
ential pressure distribution in the seal cavity. In order to study the
pressure distribution pattern on the rotor surface, take the second
cavity as an example, Fig. 25 shows the circumferential pressure
distribution on the rotor surface in the middle of the second cav-
ity for the three seals. In this figure, θ stands for the angular
coordinate in the direction of rotor spinning. The position θ = 0
deg corresponds to the minimum clearance and θ = 180 deg cor-
responds to the maximum clearance, as shown in Fig. 4. For the
LS, Fig. 25(a) indicates that the maximum pressure locates at 226
deg and minimum pressure locates at 61 deg. The maximum pres-
sure is behind the minimum clearance within the LS. For the LS
with swirl brakes, Fig. 25(b) indicates that the maximum pres-
sure locates at 30 deg and the minimum pressure locates at 239
deg. The frequent pressure fluctuation is due to the existence of
swirl brakes. At seal entrance, the swirl brakes divide the annular
channel into multiple vane-to-vane passages. In each vane-to-vane
passage, the flow field is complex. This results in the significant
difference in velocity profile at different circumferential positions
in each vane-to-vane passage. It would influence the downstream
flow field. Each pressure fluctuation corresponds to one vane-to-
vane passage. Fig. 25(c) indicates that the pressure of HCS takes
its maximum value at 68 deg and minimum value at 287 deg. The
rapid pressure fluctuation is due to the existence of helical teeth.
The pressure increase is due to the blocking effect of helical tooth.
After the helical tooth, the pressure decreases. Each pressure fluc-
tuation corresponds to one helical tooth.
In order to study the development of circumferential pressure
distribution along the axial direction, Fig. 26 shows the contours
of pressure on the cross section through the middle of three cavi-
ties for the three seals. For the LS, the positions with maximum
pressure in three cavities locate at the left side. The tangential
force obtained by integrating pressure circumferentially is positive.
12 M. Zhang, J. Yang / Aerospace Science and Technology 105 (2020) 105997

Fig. 26. Circumferential pressure distribution in the middle of three cavities.

It tends to destabilize the rotor by adding energy to the rotor mo-
tion. For the LS with swirl brakes, the high pressure zone locates
at the left side in the first cavity, which is similar to the LS. The
effect of this pressure distribution is to generate a positive tangen-
tial force. In the subsequent two cavities, the high pressure zones
locate at the right side, which is contrary to the LS. The effect of
this pressure distribution is to generate a negative tangential force.
Hence, the tangential force of LS with swirl brakes is lower than
that of LS. For the HCS, the zone with high pressure locates at the
top side in the first cavity. Its contribution to the positive tangen-
tial force is small. In the subsequent two cavities, the high pressure
zones locate at the right side. Its effect is to generate the negative
tangential force. This leads to the significant negative tangential
force for the HCS.
5. Conclusions
In this article, a novel HCS is proposed to generate the negative
circumferential spiral flow and reduce the destabilizing tangential
force. Its effectiveness in reducing tangential force and leakage is
studied by the comparison with the LS and LS with swirl brakes.
Conclusions are summarized as follows:
(1) The three seals have a comparable sealing performance. The
maximum difference of leakage flow rate between the HCS and
 M. Zhang, J. Yang / Aerospace Science and Technology 105 (2020) 105997
LS is less than 1.35%. The maximum difference of leakage flow
rate among the three seals is less than 2.5%.
(2) For the HCS, the negative circumferential spiral flow can be
generated with the guiding role of helical teeth. It can weaken
the circumferential flow within the seal gap substantially. At
seal exit, the ratio of average circumferential velocity to the
rotor surface velocity is less than 0.005.
(3) For the HCS, the tangential force decreases with the increas-
ing helical tooth number and helical tooth height. Considering
the rubbing between the helical teeth and rotor, helical tooth
height should be slightly smaller than comb tooth height. 15
deg is the preferable value for the helix angle to gain the low-
est tangential force.
(4) The HCS has the superior tangential force reduction capacity
compared with the other two seals. The tangential force of
HCS decreases by 236–620% relative to the conventional LS.
The difference between the HCS and LS is about 2–10 times as
strong as that between the LS with swirl brakes and LS.
Declaration of competing interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing finan-
cial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to
influence the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgements
This study was supported by the National Natural Science Foun-
dation of China (Nos. 51575105).
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