100 kW_e recuperated micro gas turbine

The engine was designed jointly by IIT Kanpur and Turbotech Precision Engineering Pvt. Ltd., which manufactured it and is testing it. A recuperator recovers heat from the exhaust to preheat the compressed air before the combustor, raising the efficiency of a small machine.

The design work covered the whole flow path: aerodynamic design and optimization of the centrifugal compressor impeller, a pipe diffuser, a one-dimensional meanline solver with physics-based loss models, and simulations of steady and unsteady combustion in the combustor.

Turbotech has entered a royalty-sharing agreement with IIT Kanpur for the engine.

The original combustor will be replaced by a lean premixed design from our lab, to cut NO_x emissions while running on CNG, diesel and biodiesel. Fuel is injected into swirling air in a premixing section, the flame is held by a bluff body, and liner cooling slots and dilution holes shape the exit temperature profile for the turbine.

The design draws directly on the lab's lean premixed swirl combustor for gaseous and hydrogen-blended fuels and its lean premixed prevaporized combustor for liquid fuels.