119 Journal of Innovation in Engineering Education, VOL: 2, Issue : 1, March, 2019 Design, fabrication and testing of hydro turbine with composite path runner for ultra-low head application Raj Kumar Chaulagain *1 , Dhiraj Pokhrel 2 , Kaurab Gautam 2 , Nabin Khanal 2 , Harish Bhatt 2 ABSTRACT This paper is focused on design a turbine with composite path runner for ultra low head application and fnally analyze its performance under diferent test conditions. Literature review was the starting point of research and detailed design parameters for the turbine dimensions and materials were selected taking feasibility of fabrication and testing in hand. The testing was proposed on real site of Bagmati river at Kupandole, Lalitpur, Nepal where the turbine was subjected to fuse ree- fowing water from the head of 1.3m and fowrate of 78 LPS that taken as site parameter. The 3D model for the turbine was developed in CATIA. For turbine height of 0.77m and runner minor diameter of 0.152m, simulations were carried out to fnd the most feasible number of blades, blade width, blade spacing, number of guide vanes and guide vane spacing using ANSYS simulation. Among the simulation the best arrangement was blade radial width of 62 mm, blade spacing of 54mm, guide vane spacing of 36.5 mm, total number of blades 25 and total number of guide vanes 7 keeping output power in mind. The experimental results were then compared with the data obtained from calculations and simulations. Turbine at part load of Qo/Qmax = 0.67 was tested and the resulting maximum efciency was 21.1% at 87 RPM with available fow rate of 52 LPS. Keywords: ANSYS, CATIA, Composite path, Ultra low head, part load, LPS INTRODUCTION Rural electrifcation is often conjoined with optimal use of locally available resources like ultra low head resources in mountainous country Nepal, transmission of remotely generated power to unevenly distributed villages seems costlier [1]. Conceding with this fact, low and ultra low head are being used to satiate current power demand. Ultra-low head is the situations where the hydraulic head is less than 3 m or the water fow is more than 0.5 m/s with zero head [2]. Locally established water mills and hydropower plants using Archimedeans Screw Turbine and Gravitational vortex plant are the good example of them. They are basically suitable for plain region of the country [3]. Composite path runner turbine works prominently on impulse principle. 1 Head, Department of Automobile and Mechanical Engineering, Thapathali Campus, Institute of Engineering, Tribhuvan University, Thapathali, Kathmandu, Nepal 2 Research Assistant, Department of Automobile and Mechanical Engineering, Thapathali Campus, Institute of Engineering, Tribhuvan University, Thapathali, Kathmandu, Nepal, kaurab97@gmail.com * Corresponding author : E-mail : rajkrc12@tcioe.edu.np, rajkrc12@gmail.com