Cavitation Erosion Prediction on Francis Turbines Part 3 : Methodologies of Prediction

In the frame of a joint research program between EDF, Hydro Québec and IMHEF, different methods are investigated to predict cavitation erosion on Francis turbines from model. They are based on measurement of pitting, pressure fluctuations and acceleration. The measurement techniques have been detailed in Part I and Part 2. The present article describes essentially the theoretical and practical aspects of the methods and discusses the results obtained until now from the mode! and prototype tests. The first analysis shows that the methods proposed are suitable to measure cavitation aggressiveness on mode! and on prototype, and that the level on the mode! is several orders of magnitude smaller than on the prototype. To adjust transposition laws, a more complete set of data is needed.