DAMAGE ANALISIS OF HYDRAULIC TURBINE WITH OVER 10

YEARS IN OPERATION

Komonchanh PHET-ASA
Vientiane, Laos PDR.
EDL-Training Center
Sokpaluang Road, P.O.Box 309
E-mail: edltc@laotel.com
Thawan Sucharitakul
Associate Professor
Chiang Mai University
Faculty of Engineering
Department of Mechanical Engineering
E-mail: thawan@dome.eng.cmu.ac.th

ABSTRACT A prediction of the damage from cavitation of more than 10

years 13 MW Francis turbines of Xeset hydropower plant is carried out in
this work. This damage is measured by monitoring the vibration of turbine
shaft and at the draft tube. In this study, the load of each turbine is varied
from no load to overload.
From experiment, it is found that the cavitation of turbine, which
is observed via the vibration level is depended on turbine load and speed.
In case of turbine load, it is found that turbine vibration is lowest at half
load and at full load, the vibration of turbine is higher than the half load
approximately 100%. In case of turbine speed, the experimental data
shows the highest vibration at rated speed.

1. INTRODUCTION
Hydropower is the main energy source of Lao
PDR. The increasing of demand for electric power
resulted in an intensified utilization of available
hydropower resources. Therefore, the preventive
maintenance is necessary for protecting and also
prolonging the lifetime of power plant components
especially the hydraulic turbine.
In case of Francis turbine, it normally faces with a
main severe problem from cavitation. The cavitation
leads to be destruction of the turbine blade surface and
reduces its efficiency [1]. It becomes apparent in
vibration, which can also damage pipe mountings.
Normally the cavitation of hydraulic turbine can be
monitored by noise and vibration of its components. At
present, vibration monitoring and analysis is one of a
preventive or predictive maintenance program for
turbine [2]. This instrument is used for estimating the
frequencies and amplitudes of harmonics at the running
speed. These values can indicate the development of a
fault from cavitation on turbine surface [3], [4], [5]
Fig.1 shows the Xeset 1 hydroelectric power plant
(XHPP). It has been operated since 1991 by Electricit
du Laos (EDL). There are five units hydraulic turbine
which are three units of 3 MW horizontal shaft and two
units of vertical shaft turbine. Note that the rated head of
this power plant is 155 m. Most of hydroelectric power
plants which belong to EDL have never been studied for
major damage particularly the damage from cavitation.
Therefore, for preventing serious damage, this research
will monitor and analyze the vibration of turbine. The
result can be used for determining the suitable operation
range of these hydraulic turbines.

Fig. 1 Xeset Hydropower Plant (XHPP)

2. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
In this work, the vibrations of 13 MW XHPP
turbines are measured by mounting the 2 vibration
transducers at turbine guide bearing (B2) and draft tube
(D2). These measuring point are shown in Fig. 2. The
vibration data is collected by using vibration analyzer
Type CSI 2115DX and accelerometer model 361L
having frequency response between 2.0 Hz to 10 kHz.
There are two parts of this experiment. The first
part is no load condition. At this part, the speed of
turbine is varied stepwise which are 25%, 50%, 75%,
100% and 110% of rated speed (600 rpm). For the other
part, the output load of turbine is varied from 1.50, 2.50,
3.50, 4.50, 6.50, 9.75, 13.00 and 14.20 MW while the
speed of turbine is kept constant at rated speed. Note
that, at each experiment the head of water is
approximately 157 m and the vibration result form the
monitoring apparatus is converted to RMS value by
software CSI Mastertrend v2.70f.

the limitation of turbine vibration is 4.5 mm/s and from

this experiment, it is found that the vibration at every
testing loads do not exceed this limit.

Generator

1.4
B2
1.2

Turbine

D2
P2

Fig. 2 Positions for measuring turbine vibration.

Vibration Amplitude (mm/s)

B2

Table 1 shows the prototype characteristics of the

tested XHPP turbine.

D2

1.0
0.8
0.6
0.4
0.2
0.0
0

2 3

Table 1 Prototype characteristics of XHPP turbine.

Xeset
Francis
Vertical
13 MW
155 m
600 RPM
4.5 m/s
9.65 m3/s
1090 mm
0.449
300,000 m3
482.00 m
478.00 m
322.00 m
325.40 m

9 10 11 12 13 14 15

Turbine Load (MW)

Fig.3 Turbine vibration at various loads.

1.4
B2

1.2

Vibration Amplitude (mm/s)

Power plant
Type of turbine
Orientation of shaft
Nominal Power
Nominal Head
Rotating Speed
Maximum vibration
Rated discharge
Runner outlet diameter
Runner specific speed
Live storage reservoir
Full supply level (FSL)
Min. Oper. level (MOL)
Center of turbine El.
Water level at tailrace

D2

1.0
0.8
0.6
0.4
0.2
0.0
0

3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Fig. 3 shows the effect of turbine load on vibration
of turbine. Note that the measuring points are at turbine
guide bearing (B2) and draft tube (D2). It is found that
the vibration at draft tube is higher than that of turbine
guide bearing. This undoubtedly result comes from the
well support of bearing pedestal. However, two
measuring points give the same result that the vibration
of turbine is very high at no load and it decreases with
the increasing of load till the turbine load reaches 6.5
MW. At this point the vibration of turbine is lowest.
However, if the turbine load is higher than 6.4 MW the
vibration is increases again and at the overload of 14.2
MW the vibration of turbine is highest. Since, the major
source of turbine vibration is cavitation. Therefore, for
avoiding the cavitation, the suitable running load of this
turbine should be kept constant at 6.5 MW. However, at
this condition, it is not suitable for producing only half
load instead of full load. Therefore, if turbine is run at
full load, the cavitation of turbine can not be avoided.
However, the operator should not be run the turbine at
very low load because of the high cavitation. Note that,

100

200

300

400

500

600

Turbine Speed (rpm)

Fig. 4 Turbine vibration at various speeds.

Fig. 5 Cavitation effect of turbine.

700

Fig. 4 shows the effect of turbine speed on the

vibration at no load condition. The results show that at
300 rpm the vibration is lowest. If the speed exceeds 300
rpm the vibration of turbine increases dramatically and
the highest vibration occurs at speed 600 rpm which is
the rated speed of this turbine. Therefore, at the rated
speed the opportunity to get cavitation is the highest.
Fig.5 shows the example of turbine blade which is
damaged from cavitation.
4. CONCLUSION
From this experiment, it can be concluded that, the
vibration of turbine depend on the load and speed of
turbine and higher vibration trends to get higher
cavitation. However, at this stage, the vibration of
turbine does not exceed the limit. Therefore, the severe
problem from cavitation does not occur.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
The authors would like to acknowledge the
financial support provided from EGAT Public Company
Limited and Electricit du Laos for carry out this work.
REFERENCES
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turbine runners using ADINA, 1997, p1087
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Innovative Hydraulic Turbine governor for
Predictive maintenance of hydropower plant, 2002,
p925
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of Oscillatory Problems of Hydraulic Generating
with Francis Turbines, 1997, IEEE Transactions on
Energy Conversion, Vol. 12, No. 4
[4] M. Farhat, P. Bourdon and P. Lavigne ,Some
Hydro-Qebec Experiences on the Vibratory
Approach for Cavitation Monitoring, p151-158,
1996, Lausanne, Switzerland.
[5] M. Farhat, and P. Bourdon, Improving Hydro
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