Introduction to Cavitation in Hydraulic Machinery

Design, operation and refurbishment of hydraulic turbines, pumps or pump-turbine are strongly related to cavitation flow phenomena, which may occur in either the rotating runner-impeller or the stationary parts of the machine. The paper presents the cavitation phenomena featured by fluid machinery including type of cavity development related to the specific speed of machines in both pump and turbine mode, the influence of the operating conditions, such as load, head and submergence. Therefore, for each type of cavitation illustrated by flow visualization made at the EPFL testing facilities, the influence of cavitation development on machine efficiency, operation and integrity are discussed.