Expert: Paul Soderman - 12/7/2009

Question
i am a a-level physics student trying to calculate the likely stress in a turbine blade of a Jet engine under normal operating conditions. in order to do this i have trying to find information about the geometry of turbine fan blades so that i could work out the mass of a single blade which together with its speed of rotation would enable me to calculate the stress it experiences, any help with this would be much appreciated.

Thank you very much

yours in anticipation

Bob

Answer
Bob
As you can imagine there are big turbofans and small turbofans.  Here is a link to the GE J85 turbojet:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Electric_J85

It is on the smaller size, but you can scale off the turbine blade dimensions from the specifications and the image of the cut away engine.  True dimensions are hard to find.  The turbine blades are curved rectangles with some camber more or less.  It is a two-stage turbine.
Paul