Fuel droplet size measurements with a laser Doppler interferometer
Abstract
It is pointed out that the injection and atomization of liquid fuel into a gas turbine combustion system plays a major role in many key aspects of combustion system performance. Fuel droplet diameters represent one of the parameters which determine the burning rate. The present investigation is concerned with a commercially available laser Doppler interferometer which has been used by an American manufacturer of aircraft engines to measure fuel droplet size distributions downstream of several different fuel injectors and combinations of fuel injectors and combustor dome swirl cups. The considered instrument has a very small sample volume, which permits measurements of droplet size distributions and droplet Sauter Mean Diameters (SMD) at a large number of discrete points in the spray pattern. The design and the principles of operation of the droplet sizing interferometer (DSI) are discussed along with alignment procedures, test configurations, and test results.
- Publication:
-
AIAA, SAE, ASME, and ASEE, 21st Joint Propulsion Conference
- Pub Date:
- July 1985
- Bibcode:
- 1985jpmc.confR....T
- Keywords:
-
- Drop Size;
- Fuel Injection;
- Fuel Sprays;
- Gas Turbine Engines;
- Interferometry;
- Diameters;
- Laser Applications;
- Spray Nozzles;
- Velocity Measurement;
- Visibility;
- Fluid Mechanics and Heat Transfer