Study of Development of a Novel Dual Phase Airblast Injector for Gas Turbine Combustor

Abstract

A novel airblast injector is designed for gas turbine combustors. Unlike standard pressure swirl and prefilming/non-prefilming air blast atomizers, the novel injector is designed to improve the fuel injection delivery to the injector and improve atomization of the fuel by using a porous stainless steel tube. There are three swirling air streams in the injector. The liquid fuel is injected through the porous tube, with 7 micron porosity, between the swirling air streams, viz. an inner swirling air through the tube and the other two swirling air streams merging downstream of the tube. The swirl vane angles and the air split ratio are selected to increase the amount of air through the injector and facilitate the atomization process. The liquid fuel is injected through the outer surface of the porous tube, due to the permeability of the tube, produces a thin liquid sheet on the inner surface of the tube. The atomization occurs by surface stripping of the liquid sheet. The advantage of such an injector is that it produces a liquid sheet with uniform thickness around the circumference of the tube under all liquid loading. The porous tube also increases the surface area of contact between the fuel and air and produces a fine spray at engine idle conditions. An experimental approach is adopted in the present study to characterize the spray and aerodynamics of the injector for Jet-A and Gas-To-Liquid (GTL) fuels at atmospheric conditions. The effect of flare height on the Sauter Mean Diameter (SMD) is also studied. Spray characterization, droplet size and volume flux are investigated with PDI measurements. The effect of pressure drop and fuel properties on SMD distribution is analyzed. Velocity profiles at downstream of the injector are obtained from LDV measurements, and the velocity profile at the exit of the injector is also analyzed. A central toroidal recirculation zone (CTRZ) is observed at the exit of the injector. The effect of different configurations of the injector on spray characteristics is studied. A correlation for SMD is obtained.