Numerical investigations of the flow induced oscillation of a torque converter

The flow induced oscillation of a three-element torque converter was investigated numerically under various operational conditions. A two-way coupling fluid-structure interaction simulation was performed using ANSYS® -Fluent® along with the ANSYS® Transient Structural module. The fluid pressure excitation and the dynamic structure response were investigated at various turbine/pump rotation speed ratios SR ∈ [0.00.8]. The maximum pressure blade load and structural deflections were observed in the stall condition, corresponding to the highest torque transmission ratio. The pressure pulsations and structure oscillations were monitored at locations selected on the basis of time-averaged distributions. The turbine oscillations were dominated by the frequency of pump blade passing at SR = 0.0. The stator always oscillated under impact from the upstream flow with the dominating pump shaft frequency. Both the time-averaged and instantaneous features revealed that the pump oscillations were almost independent of SR.