Experimental Characterization of Two-Phase Aerated Liquid Ethanol and Jet A Spray Flames

Abstract

This work provides an analysis of an air-assisted atomizing nebulizer’s spray characteristics and combustion behaviors via application of various diagnostics. Two-phase far-field flows and flames of liquid ethanol and practical aviation fuel Jet A were characterized for the droplet distributions, fuel concentrations, and flame dynamics by shadowgraph, Mie scattering, and chemiluminescence imaging of CH*, C2*, and CO2*. Both instantaneous and time-averaged measurements of the two-phase flow and flame characteristics were obtained. Shadowgraphs were used to measure the probability distribution of the droplet diameters. Mie scattering was used to map fuel concentration and obtain the liquid spray cone angles. Estimates of the lifted flame height were obtained by both shadowgraph and Mie scattering, which were verified by the chemiluminescence images. The effect of flow rates on parameters such as flow characteristic, spray cone angle, and drop size spectrum were quantitatively characterized for both ethanol and practical aviation fuel Jet A.

Keywords

• aerated spray
• flames
• jet A combustion
• optical characterization