Development History and Field Experiences of the First FT8 Gas Turbine With Dry Low NOx Combustion System

Abstract

This paper describes the FT8-2 Dry Low NOx (DLN) combustor development process and reviews the development history and initial field experience at a natural gas pipeline station in Germany. The development process is primarily focused on defining a fuel nozzle or injector, investigating emissions, fuel-air mixing, flame stability, acoustics, flashback resistance, and flame disgorgement. Empirical development tools including single nozzle and sector combustion rigs, as well as flame imaging techniques, are discussed. A summary of in-house engine development testing is provided. The control methodology used to meet emissions, while maintaining combustor pressure pulsations at an acceptable level, is provided. The natural gas compressor station design and operational experience with a GHH BORSIG compressor driven by the FT8 engine in Werne, Germany is summarized. Also presented are details of the very short conversion period from Standard to DLN combustor with the first successful ignition of the engine 26 days after work had begun.

Dynamics and stability of lean-premixed swirl-stabilized combustion

“…A simplified model for bulk-mode combustor instabilities coupled with Helmholtz resonators was developed, and was used to determine the influence of system parameters on damping augmentation achievable with resonators. Other applications of Helmholtz resonators to gas turbines have been reported in the literature (Schlein et al [57], Dupere and Dowling [313], Mastrovito et al [314]). …”

Analysis of V-Gutter Reacting Flow Dynamics Using Proper Orthogonal and Dynamic Mode Decompositions

“…The thermoacoustic issue is expressed as the pressure fluctuating inside the combustor. When the dry low NOx (DLN) combustion system in the FT8 engine was first developed, the frequency of the dynamic pressure fluctuation showed a 200-400 Hz range [1]. This pulsation has been damped by adding additional acoustic resonators [2] while more complicated designs should be considered, such as the cooling of resonators.…”

Design and Decomposition Analysis of Mixing Zone Structures on Flame Dynamics for a Swirl Burner

“…The first one is the design of the swirl generation. Primarily, the development of the lean swirl combustor was focused on a swirl generator device; for example, the cone shells and slots in the EV (EnVironmental) burners in ABB [9] and Siemens [10] burners, and the axial swirl vane developed from DLE in the LM6000 to DLN series in heavy-duty gas turbines [11]. In this work, the axial swirler with a velocity-based swirl number of 0.4 was applied for all the simulation cases.…”