Centrifugal pumps' impellers design and digital fabrication

Design of three centrifugal pump impellers is presented in this paper. All impellers are designed in Catia software by Dassault Systems. Impellers have the same outer diameter of 50 mm, but various blade numbers: 5, 6 and 8. In addition, various design techniques are applied. These impellers are followed by the same spiral pump casing. The intention is to study the energy characteristics of the pump impellers, originally designed for various purposes on the same test rig. All three impellers are made on the 3D printing machine — Printrbot Simple. Build volume is 150 mm × 150 mm × 150 mm. Used filament is 1.75 mm PLA/PHA colorFabb 3D printing filament 1.75 mm diameter, standard black, with nozzle 0.4 mm. Print bed is not heated. First tests have shown good impeller durability in operating conditions.