Experimental study on flame development and stabilization in a kerosene fueled supersonic combustor

Abstract

Abstract Flame development and stabilization in a kerosene fueled supersonic combustor with air throttling were experimentally investigated in the present paper. Stagnation conditions were 1100 K and 1.0 MPa and Mach number at the isolator entrance was 2.0. Various measurements included schlieren, shadow, interferometry, flame emission and PLIF were made during the experiments in an attempt to better understand the combustion flow field. The flow structure of non-reacting flow with and without air throttling was investigated firstly, the results showed a shock train was generated due to the increased back pressure by the throttling air, shock waves of the two cases oscillated with the flow. The flame development of pilot hydrogen was studied secondly, the ER (Equivalence Ratio) of pilot hydrogen should be 0.1, because a stable flame was beneficial to ignition transient. Finally, the effects of air throttling on flame stabilization were investigated, time for ignition of the case with air throttling was nearly a third of the case without air throttling, the pilot flame was blown off by the room temperature kerosene. But the kerosene was ignited successfully by the pilot hydrogen with the aid of air throttling, and even when the throttling air was removed, the flame was still stable.