Flow characteristics in the liner of a reverse-flow gas turbine combustor

Abstract

Investigation carried out in a plane model of a reverse-flow gas turbine combustor under isothermal flow conditions has shown that the bulk of the flow remains close to the outer liner wall between the rows of primary and dilution holes, while it shifts towards the liner mid-plane after the row of dilution holes. At the combustor outlet, the bulk of the flow remains towards the inner wall of the outlet duct, with a uniform flow distribution. At the outlet of the combustor model, turbulence intensity was approximately three times higher than that at the inlet plane.

Liner dome shape effect on the annulus flow characteristics with and without swirl for a can-combustor model

“…Moreover, a comparison of experimental data with the results of a numerical computation demonstrates the capability of predicting the flow field in combustor diffusers with reasonable accuracy. Bharani et al [14] investigated the effect of swirl with different intensities at inlet on the flow characteristics in the outer annulus of a prototype reverse-flow gas turbine combustor. They observed that imposition of swirl improves the flow uniformity at outlet.…”

Numerical investigation of flow in the liner of a model reverse-flow gas turbine combustor

“…The outer liner surface has one row of plunged dilution holes and one row of plain primary Fig. 1 Schematic layout of the prototype combustor [7] Table 1 Geometric details of the prototype combustor Height of the inlet passage plane-A 12 mm Height of the outer annulus 8.5 mm Height of the inner annulus at the dome end 7.5 mm Height of the inner annulus at the turn-section 10.5 mm Diameter of dilution holes 7 mm Diameter of primary holes 3.5 mm Pitch of dilution holes 28 mm Pitch of primary holes 14 mm Swirl number 0.875 Protrusion of dilution holes tip surface 1.5 mm holes. The inner liner surface also has a similar type of dilution and primary holes placed just below the corresponding row of outer dilution and primary holes, such that the dilution and primary holes in the outer and the inner liner surface have the same axis.…”

“…Crocker and Smith [6] have predicted dilution zone flow behaviour for angular dilution jets. Bharani et al [7] investigated experimentally the flow characteristics in the liner of a reverse-flow combustor under isothermal flow conditions. Gordon and Levy [8] presented a numerical simulation to predict the reliability of CFD modelling in gas turbine combustors with complex geometry by modelling the entire flow field from the compressor diffuser to the turbine inlet.…”

“…This present study aims to investigate the flow in the liner of a model reverse-flow gas turbine combustor and to show the capability of the turbulence models to predict the flow characteristics in this complex three-dimensional geometry. In this work the experimental data of Bharani et al [7] have been employed for comparison. Limitations of the physical models embedded in the commercial CFD codes and insufficient numerical accuracy are two major difficulties.…”