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Investigation of performance in a cylindrical trapped vortex combustor with swirler

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Abstract

Trapped vortex combustor has been widely used in many aero-engines due to its ability to achieve low emission and low total pressure loss. The swirler also has a wide application since it can produce the effects of stabilizing the combustion. However, the numerical study regarding the combination of them has not been well investigated. In the current work, the availability of using the swirler on the trapped vortex combustor is numerically studied and the superiority is verified. Besides, the effects of the position of the combustor cavity and the swirl number are studied. The results indicate that the flow field of the proposed combustor can be stable in a wide inlet velocity range and the combustion efficiency can be remarkably improved. Then, the outlet temperature distribution gets more uniform and the total pressure loss can keep in an acceptable range. Also, the NOx emission is lower when operating in a high-speed working condition. In addition, the optimum position of the cavity is determined, which is that the distance between the inlet and the cavity is 10 mm. Finally, it is found that the swirl number mainly affects the flow field and temperature distribution. Therefore, a blade installation angle of 45° should be a reasonable value.

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Data availability

All data included in this study are available upon request by contact with the corresponding author.

Abbreviations

c :

Mass fraction of the species (%)

c p :

Specific heat at constant pressure (J/(kg·K)

CFD :

Computational fluid dynamics

CH 4 :

Methane

D :

Diffusion coefficient (m2/s)

D 1 :

Swirler inner diameter (m)

D 2 :

Swirler outer diameter (m)

D 3 :

Cavity diameter (m)

D 4 :

Combustion chamber diameter (m)

E :

Energy density (J/m3)

Hf :

Height (m)

k :

Turbulent kinetic energy (J)

K :

Thermal conductivity (W/(m·K))

L 1 :

Swirler length (m)

L 2 :

Combustion chamber length (m)

L 3 :

Distance between swirler and cavity (m)

L 4 :

Cavity length (m)

N-S :

Navier-Stokes

p :

Static pressure (Pa)

P 1 * :

Total pressure at the inlet (Pa)

P 2 * :

Total pressure at the outlet (Pa)

S :

Swirl number

S T :

Viscous dissipation

T :

Temperature (K)

TVC :

Trapped vortex combustor

u :

Velocity components in the x direction (m/s)

v :

Velocity components in the y direction (m/s)

Y in :

CH4 mass fraction at the inlet (%)

Y out :

CH4 mass fraction at the outlet (%)

β :

Angle between axial direction and vane (°)

δ * :

Total pressure loss (%)

ε :

Turbulent dissipation rate (%)

η :

Combustion efficiency (%)

ρ :

Density of gas mixture (kg/m3)

τ :

Stress tensor (N/m2)

\(\dot{\omega_k}\)  :

Chemical reaction rate (kg/(m3·s))

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Acknowledgements

The authors did not receive support from any organization for the submitted work. In addition, Jin Xie asked his girlfriend to marry him in [37], and the answer from Ms. Yan Huang is: “Yes, I will”. Best wishes for them.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Politecnico di Torino, 24 Corso Duca degli Abruzzi, 10129, Turin, Italy

    Baisen Zheng, Yueliang Zhang & Jin Xie

  2. School of Energy and Power Engineering, Jiangsu University, 301 Xuefu Road, Zhenjiang, 212013, China

    Jin Xie

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Correspondence to Jin Xie.

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Zheng, B., Zhang, Y. & Xie, J. Investigation of performance in a cylindrical trapped vortex combustor with swirler. Heat Mass Transfer 59, 1121–1137 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00231-022-03319-7

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