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Preliminary observations on Failure of parts of cooling Turbine of Su30MKI aircraft

Recently, SU30 MKI aircraft has developed engine problem due to failure of cooling turbines (Part nos. 3314). These cooling turbines have been sent to HAL, Lucknow for defect investigation. The investigation has revealed the damage of bearings, shaft and Fan (Ventilator) blades of cooling turbines. Subsequent investigation at Air Force base has revealed not only the damage of compressor blades of LH engines caused by the broken blades of fan of cooling turbine but also rupture of oil charging pipe at charging plug of the cooling turbine (Part no. 3314). The damaged parts such as fans, bearings, shafts, charging pipe of the turbo coolers have been received at DMRL for detailed failure investigation to identify causes of failure of these parts. The results of failure investigation of turbo cooler fan (Part no. 3314) are presented in this report. Ventlator/fan: The photograph of the damaged turbo cooler fan/ventilator is shown in Fig.1. It can be seen from Fig. 1 that all the five blades of the fan have broken at the root and blade pieces are found missing. It has been informed that the fan along with its five blades was fabricated from the same block of the alloy by machining. Fracture surfaces of the blade roots on the fan base were marked with numbers 1 to 5 for identification (Fig. 1). The magnified view of the region of the fan base between the blades, as illustrated in Fig. 2, reveal a pattern of deep markings almost parallel to fan blades.
Blade route 1 Blade route 2

Deep markings

Blade root

Fig. 1

Blade route 5

Fig. 2

Blade route 3

Blade route 4

Fracture surface of all five blade roots were examined using scanning electron microscopy. The five blade roots are henceforth referred to as BR1, BR2, BR3, BR4 and BR5. Figures 3 and 4 show fracture features recorded in case of blade rootsBR1

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and BR2, respectively. Figure 3a and 4a show the cracks along deep marks on the fan base next to blade roots. Thumb nail as well as beach marks, typical of fatigue fracture, observed on one side of the fracture surface of blade roots BR1 and BR2 are shown in Fig. 3 (b) and 4 (b), respectively. Fig.5 shows fatigue striations confirming that crack has propagated by Fatigue.

3a

4a

Fig. 3

Fig. 4

4b 3b

Fig. 5

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The fracture surfaces of BR3, BR4 and BR5 have shown over load fracture features. Microstrctural examination essentially showing colony structure of transformed with coarse prior grain size as well as coarse colony size. SEM micrographs revealed that the transformed structure consists of alternate lamellae (grey in contrast) and (white in contrast) phase. Also, laths are very coarse. The fracture of blades BR1 and BR2 has occurred by initiation and propagation of fatigue cracks. The fracture features such as thumb nail and beach marks at lower magnification and striations at higher magnification clearly indicate this proposition. In these two blades, after propagation of fatigue crack to a considerable extent the remaining ligament failed by overload. Also, multiple fatigue cracks have been found to initiate and propagate in these cases. The important observation is that these fatigue cracks have been found to initiate from the deep markings existing on the fan base.. On the other hand, the predominant overload fracture features in case blade BR3, BR4 and BR5 suggest that both these blades failed essentially by overload.

Oil changing pipe: The rupture of oil charging pipe at charging plug of the cooling turbine has shown overload fracture features and the features are covered by oxide layer. Based on these preliminary investigation and thus obtained metallurgical observations, it may be stated that the series of events that lead to failure of turbo cooler components and in turn the damage of compressor blades are as follows. First, the premature fatigue failure of a few fan blades has occurred due to deep surface marks (probably machine marks) combined with coarse microstructure features of the fan alloy (i.e., transformed structure as well as coarse grain size and colony size ). The fracture of these two blades might have created fracture of the remaining 3 blades which might have resulted in dynamic imbalance in the turbo cooler section leading to the failure of the oil changing pipe and bearings and the shaft.