Reflection error correction of gas turbine blade temperature

• Reflection error greatly affects radiation thermometer measurements.
• Correction of this error in gas turbine blades has been provided.
• The method was demonstrated through simulation and an experiment.
• Results achieved showed significant reduction of the error.

Accurate measurement of gas turbine blades’ temperature is one of the greatest challenges encountered in gas turbine temperature measurements. Within an enclosed gas turbine environment with surfaces of varying temperature and low emissivities, a new challenge is introduced into the use of radiation thermometers due to the problem of reflection error. A method for correcting this error has been proposed and demonstrated in this work through computer simulation and experiment. The method assumed that emissivities of all surfaces exchanging thermal radiation are known. Simulations were carried out considering targets with low and high emissivities of 0.3 and 0.8 respectively while experimental measurements were carried out on blades with emissivity of 0.76. Simulated results showed possibility of achieving error less than 1% while experimental result corrected the error to 1.1%. It was thus concluded that the method is appropriate for correcting reflection error commonly encountered in temperature measurement of gas turbine blades.