Dynamic blade particle separator

Claim 1

In a gas turbine engine assembly including a compressor stage having an axial flow inlet thereto, a rotatable drive shaft to drive the compressor blades, a dynamic particle separator stage driven by the engine shaft for removing contaminant particles from the axial stream flow of air supplied to the compressor inlet, said particle separator comprising: an annular housing assembly mounted ahead of the compressor inlet, the assembly outer wall and inner wall defining an annular air intake passageway to provide an axial flow path to the compressor stage; a rotor downstream of said intake passageway and journaled coaxially with the engine drive shaft and driven thereby, the axis of said rotor being coaxial with the flow path in the intake passageway, said rotor having an outer diameter the same as the inner wall of said intake passageway to define the inner wall of the axial flow path thereabout; a plurality of radially extending particle separator blades mounted on said rotor for movement in a transverse plane in the axial flow path through the annular inlet passageway, each blade extending radially across the axial flow path at least the radial length of the intake passageway, each of said blades being formed with a radial passage within the blade; each separator blade having a radially extending slot formed on the pressure side of said blade and a radially extending catching lip on the pressure side defining one edge of said slot, said slot opening into the blade radial passage wherein transverse movement of said blades through the axial flow path of said inlet passageway entraps particles by said catching lip and slot whereby the particles are centrifuged radially outwardly within the blade radial passage due to centrifugal force; a particle collecting chamber externally of the particle separator stage, said collecting chamber being in communication with the ends of each of said particle blades wherein particles are centrifuged radially outwardly from said blades into said particle collecting chamber; an annular shroud carried by said blades and mounted adjacent the outer end of said separator blades, said shroud forming a rotatable inner wall of said particle collecting chamber, said shroud and rotor defining the inner and outer wall for the axial flow path through the particle separator stage; annular seals in said inlet passageway coacting with said annular shroud to provide a particle seal for said collecting chamber wherein particles in said chamber are prevented from returning to said inlet passageway.