Control and Use of a Miniaturized Droplet Generator

Abstract

AbstractA miniaturized droplet generator with some new features, working on the principle of laminar liquid jet instability and break‐up was designed. The instrument has been used to study the dispersion of monosized droplets in a turbulent swirling flow, exhibiting the main features of combustion chamber flows of modern gas turbines.The operating range of the generator was evaluated by phase‐Dopper anemometry (PDA). It was demonstrated that the device also works in some metastable operating modes, producing coherent droplet streams with very small standard deviations for drop size and drop velocity. Special attention was directed to the reliability of the device and to the control of drop size. The PDA measurements showed that, in contrast to the evaluated optimum excitation frequency, the drop size cannot be determined from the orifice diameter.