Definition of turbine - What it is, Meaning and Concept

In Latin it is where we can find the etymological origin of the word turbine that now concerns us, specifically, it derives from the Latin term “turbo”, which can be translated as “eddy”.

also expose that the first time the cited word was used was at the beginning of the 19th century, and it was created by the French scientist Benoit Fourneyron in the year 1827 to define the practical turbine that he shaped.This was one of the many inventions that, throughout his life, he undertook, which is considered the father of the hydraulic turbine.

A turbine is a machine formed by a wheel with several vanes.When receiving a liquid continuously in its central part, the turbine expels it towards its circumference and he manages to harness his energy to generate a driving force .

What a turbine does, therefore, is to take advantage of the pressure of a liquid to get a wheel with turns propellers and produce a movement.It can be said, therefore, that the turbine is an engine that produces mechanical energy .

The propellers or vanes of the wheel are located in its circumference.The liquid that enters the turbine, therefore, generates the force of tangential type that gives movement to the wheel, causing it to rotate.A axis , finally, is responsible for transferring said mechanical energy to another machine or device.

It is possible to distinguish between a wide variety of turbines according to their operation.A wind turbine , for example, is one that takes advantage of the kinetic energy that is in the wind to get mechanical energy.Wind turbines were frequent in the mills.

The hydraulic turbine , on the other hand, works with the energy that is present in a fluid.Thanks to the axle that is linked to the wheel, this kind of turbine It can offer the energy needed to mobilize a machine or to produce electric power through a generator.Hydroelectric power plants, in fact, use turbines of this class.

We cannot ignore the existence of what is known as the Kaplan turbine.This is a type of water turbine that bases its operation on an impeller that comes to perform the same function and in a similar way as the helix of a embarcacion.If it is called this is in honor of its inventor, the Austrian engineer Viktor Kaplan (1876-1934).

That patent said device and although, at first, it was considered that it could not be manufactured or have the expected result finally ended up triumphing.Yes, it began to be used both in textile factories and in power plants.

On the other hand, we also find the so-called Francis turbine, which is of mixed reaction and flow.It was created by James B.Francis, it is of hydraulic type and currently where it is used most frequently is in hydroelectric plants, since which has great efficiency.

Within the aforementioned previous classification are the turbines:

* of action: the fluid does not change pressure at any time of its passage through the impeller, but is reduced from the value it has when entering the turbine until reaching the atmospheric pressure in the steering crown.distinguishes mainly by not having a suction pipe.One of the most efficient classes is the Pelton turbine, which has a tangential flow and a low number of revolutions, generally less than or equal to 30;

* of reaction: the pressure of its fluid changes considerably when passing through the impeller, since when it enters it its value is higher than that of the atmospheric pressure and when leaving it shows an important depression.Among its main characteristics it can be said which has a suction pipe that connects the fluid discharge zone with the impeller outlet.According to the configuration of its blades (each of its curved vanes towards which the fluid impulse is directed), it is possible to speak of a turbine fixed blades and adjustable blades (both can have diagonal flow or axial flow).

On the other hand there is the thermal turbine, which is characterized by the important change in density that its working fluid undergoes when passing through the machine.At first sight it is possible to distinguish two groups, given the main features of its design:

* the gas turbine , which appeals to a gas as a fluid to obtain the energy necessary for its operation, and which does not show a phase change of the fluid when this crosses the impeller;

* the steam turbine, in which the working fluid can undergo phase changes when passing through the impeller.Two of the most common types are steam turbines and mercury turbines.

Other subgroups that can be recognized within thermal turbines are:

* turbine to action: the energy transfer only occurs when the fluid velocity changes and the enthalpy jump (of the thermodynamic magnitude that is equivalent to adding its internal energy to the product of the volume by the external pressure) occurs only in the stator (the fixed part within which the rotor rotates);

* jet turbine: the enthalpy jump occurs in the stator and in the impeller, or only in the rotor.