Interactive Effects in Two-Droplets Combustion of RP-3 Kerosene under Sub-Atmospheric Pressure

Hongtao Zhang,Jie Huang,Kefa Cen,Zhihua Wang,Yong He

doi:10.3390/pr9071229

Abstract

To improve our understanding of the interactive effects in combustion of binary multicomponent fuel droplets at sub-atmospheric pressure, combustion experiments were conducted on two fibre-supported RP-3 kerosene droplets at pressures from 0.2 to 1.0 bar. The burning life of the interactive droplets was recorded by a high-speed camera and a mirrorless camera. The results showed that the flame propagation time from burning droplet to unburned droplet was proportional to the normalised spacing distance between droplets and the ambient pressure. Meanwhile, the maximum normalised spacing distance from which the left droplet can be ignited has been investigated under different ambient pressure. The burning rate was evaluated and found to have the same trend as the single droplet combustion, which decreased with the reduction in the pressure. For every experiment, the interactive coefficient was less than one owing to the oxygen competition, except for the experiment at L/D0 = 2.5 and P = 1.0 bar. During the interactive combustion, puffing and microexplosion were found to have a significant impact on secondary atomization, ignition and extinction.

Highlights

State Key Laboratory of Clean Energy Utilization, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310027, China; Abstract: To improve our understanding of the interactive effects in combustion of binary multicomponent fuel droplets at sub-atmospheric pressure, combustion experiments were conducted on two fibre-supported RP-3 kerosene droplets at pressures from 0.2 to 1.0 bar
The variation in droplet diameter and phenomena of puffing and microexplosion were spherical due to gravity and puffing, the droplet diameter was evaluated by πD2/4 = A, tracked by a black/white high-speed camera (IDT Y4-S1) at 2000 frames/s with an exposure where A is the droplet area extracted from the images, and D is the droplet diameter
Chinese RP-3 kerosene was used as the fuel for all the experiments, which consisted was installed behind the droplets to provide enough light

Summary

Introduction

State Key Laboratory of Clean Energy Utilization, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310027, China; Abstract: To improve our understanding of the interactive effects in combustion of binary multicomponent fuel droplets at sub-atmospheric pressure, combustion experiments were conducted on two fibre-supported RP-3 kerosene droplets at pressures from 0.2 to 1.0 bar. It is well understood that puffing is due to inner droplet bubble nucleation, growth and rupture of the fuel droplet under superheating [10]. This process is capable of enhancing species mixing inside the droplet, deforming the liquid–gas interface and the droplet shape, and causing secondary breakup of the droplet. RP-3 kerosene is the most widely used aviation fuel in China [12], its combustion characteristics under sub-atmospheric pressure have not been well studied

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Results

Conclusion