Thermodynamic analysis of chemical precooled turbine combined engine cycle

Abstract

The precooling technology is an effective way to expand the flight envelope of the turbine engine. To solve the problem of engine performance degradation caused by excessive fuel consumption, a new type of chemical precooled engine cycle is proposed, in which part of the heat energy from the incoming air is converted into the chemical energy by pyrolytic reaction. To evaluate the engine performance, a thermodynamic model is established. Based on this model, the experiments are performed to obtain the chemical heat sink of selected fuels. Through the simulation, it is found that the specific impulse is greatly improved because the fuel consumption is effectively reduced by introducing the chemical precooling process. Moreover, the highest operating Mach number (HOMN) of the precooled turbine channel is effected by different component parameters, among which the increase of the turbine inlet temperature has the most significant effect on rising the HOMN. Furthermore, the optimal fuel ratio can be obtained when the equivalence ratio is equal to 1.0, and the fuel consumption can be saved by 42% ~ 52% at this time. In general, the results in this paper are beneficial for developing high-performance turbine combined engines.