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This paper describes the Large Eddy Simulation (LES) of a methanol/air turbulent nonpremixed spray flame. An Eulerian stochastic field method is employed for the turbulence-chemistry interaction of the gas phase while a Lagrangian formulation is used for the liquid phase. A reduced reaction mechanism (18 species and 14 reactions) is adopted and stochastic models are used to account for the influence of sub-grid scale (sgs) motions on droplet dispersion and evaporation. Comparisons of the predicted gas phase and droplet statistics with measurements show a good agreement confirming that the droplet dispersion and evaporation models used in this work are adequate. The general features of the spray flame such as the occurrence of external group combustion and its development into separate combusting islands are well captured.

A computational investigation of a turbulent methanol/air spray flame in which a poly-dispersed droplet distribution is achieved through the use of a pressure-swirl atomiser (also known as a simplex atomiser) is presented. A previously formulated stochastic approach towards the modelling of the breakup of droplets in the context of Large Eddy Simulation (LES) is extended to simulate methanol/air flames arising from simplex atomisers. Such atomisers are frequently used to deliver fine droplet distributions in both industrial and laboratory configurations where they often operate under low-pressure drop conditions. The paper describes improvements to the breakup model that are necessary to correctly represent spray formation from simplex atomisers operated under low-pressure drop conditions. The revised breakup model, when used together with the existing stochastic models for droplet dispersion and evaporation, is shown to yield simulated results for a non-reacting spray that agree well with the experimentally measured droplet distribution, spray dynamics and size-velocity correlation. The sub-grid scale (sgs) probability density function (pdf) approach in conjunction with the Eulerian stochastic field method are employed to represent the unknown interaction between turbulence and chemistry at the sub-filter level while a comprehensive kinetics model for methanol oxidation with 18 chemical species and 84 elementary steps is used to account for the gas-phase reaction. A qualitative comparison of the simulated OH images to those obtained from planar laser-induced fluorescence (PLIF) confirms that the essential features of this turbulent spray flame are well captured using the pdf approach. They include the location of the leading-edge combustion (or lift-off height) and the formation of a double reaction zone due to the polydisperse spray. In addition, the influence of the spray flame on the structure of the reacting spray in respect of the mean droplet diameters and spray velocities is reproduced to a good level of accuracy

The current work presents numerical investigations of model burner in which a non-swirling air-assisted methanol spray is injected using a pressure-swirl atomizer. A stochastic breakup model is formulated in the context of Large Eddy Simulation (LES) and validated by detailed comparisons of the results with measurements. An excellent agreement is achieved for the non-reactive case in terms of the dispersion of the spray, the mean droplet distributions and the time-averaged spray velocities. The transported probability density function (pdf ) equation/Eulerian stochastic field method are used to represent the interaction of turbulence and chemistry while the gas phase reaction of the methanol/air spray flame is described by a reduced reaction mechanism involving 18 chemical species and 84 elementary steps. The sub-grid scale (sgs) chemistry model in conjunction with the formulated breakup model are found to capture the influence of the flame on droplet dynamics together with the formation of a double reaction zone typically resulting from a polydisperse spray to a good accuracy.