Which mechanical effect limited the size of late 19th-century steam turbine blades before the advent of improved metallurgy?

💡 Explanation

When steam turbine blades rotate at high speeds, centrifugal forces increase quadratically with rotational speed and radius, causing tensile stress on the blade material potentially exceeding its tensile strength. Therefore fracture from centrifugal forces results, rather than buckling, creep, or resonance which require different stress conditions or material properties.

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