Experiments and numerical simulations were carried out in order to contribute to a better understanding and prediction of high-pressure injection into a gaseous environment. Specifically, the focus was put on the phase separation processes of an initially supercritical fluid due to the interaction with its surrounding. N-hexane was injected into a chamber filled with pure nitrogen at 5 MPa and 293 K and three different test cases were selected such that they cover regimes in which the thermodynamic non-idealities, in particular the effects that stem from the potential phase separation, are significant. Simultaneous shadowgraphy and elastic light scattering experiments were conducted to capture both the flow structure as well as the phase separation. In addition, large-eddy simulations with a vaporliquid equilibrium model were performed. Both experimental and numerical results show phase formation for the cases, where the a-priori calculation predicts two-phase flow. Moreover, qualitative characteristics of the formation process agree well between experiments and numerical simulations and the transition behaviour from a dense-gas to a spray-like jet was captured by both.

Experiments and numerical simulations were carried out in order to contribute to a better understanding and prediction of high-pressure injection into a gaseous environment. Specifically, the focus was put on the phase separation processes of an initially supercritical fluid due to the interaction with its surrounding. N-hexane was injected into a chamber filled with pure nitrogen at 5 MPa and 293 K and three different test cases were selected such that they cover regimes in which the thermodynamic non-idealities, in particular the effects that stem from the potential phase separation, are significant. Simultaneous shadowgraphy and elastic light scattering experiments were conducted to capture both the flow structure as well as the phase separation. In addition, large-eddy simulations with a vaporliquid equilibrium model were performed. Both experimental and numerical results show phase formation for the cases, where the a-priori calculation predicts two-phase flow. Moreover, qualitative characteristics of the formation process agree well between experiments and numerical simulations and the transition behaviour from a dense-gas to a spray-like jet was captured by both.Keywords elastic light scattering, shadowgraphy, large-eddy simulation, Peng-Robinson, tangent plane distance IntroductionInjection into a high-pressure gaseous environment is a crucial process within energy conversion machines. Nowadays, many fluid flow devices are operated at pressures that exceed the critical pressure pc of the involved pure fluids. The increase in operating pressure in aircraft and car engines mainly stems from the demand for higher engine efficiency and reduced CO2 emissions. The main reason for rising the chamber pressure in liquid rocket engines (LREs) is the proportionality between operating pressure and specific impulse [1]. Typically, the operating pressure in LREs is supercritical with respect to both fuel and oxidizer (p > pc), whereas the injection temperature may be sub-or supercritical, corresponding to liquid-like or gas-like states. At supercritical pressure, the fluid properties, such as density, enthalpy and viscosity, are highly non-linear functions of temperature and pressure. Furthermore, phase separation due to non-linear interaction of the different components may occur. The phenomenon of phase separation due to mixing at high pressures is well-known in process engineering. Remarkably, up to now, high-pressure fuel injection into a gaseous environment is not completely understood and no commonly accepted theoretical approach exists. Within the past 20 years, many research groups have focused on understanding the behaviour of jets at high pressures using experimental and numerical methods. Chehroudi et al. [2] injected cryogenic nitrogen into gaseous nitrogen at sub-and supercritical pressures. Based on shadowgraphy visualizations, they observed classical twophase phenomena at subcritical pressure indicated by very fine ligaments and droplets being ejected from the jet. As the pressure exceeds the cr...

No abstract

A numerical framework implemented in the open-source tool OpenFOAM is presented in this work combining a hybrid, pressure-based solver with a vapor-liquid equilibrium model based on the cubic equation of state. This framework is used in the present work to investigate underexpanded jets at engine-relevant conditions where real-gas effects and mixture induced phase separation are probable to occur. A thorough validation and discussion of the applied vapor-liquid equilibrium model is conducted by means of general thermodynamic relations and measurement data available in the literature. Enginerelevant simulation cases for two different fuels were defined. Analyses of the flow field show that the used fuel has a first order effect on the occurrence of phase separation. In the case of phase separation two different effects could be revealed causing the single-phase instability, namely the strong expansion and the mixing of the fuel with the chamber gas. A comparison of single-phase and two-phase jets disclosed that the phase separation leads to a completely different penetration depth in contrast to single-phase injection and therefore commonly used analytical approaches fail to predict the penetration depth.

In the present work, numerical simulations are carried out to investigate underexpanded methane jets with phase separation effects. In order to predict the fuel injection and the mixture formation in the constant volume chamber, a hybrid, pressure-based solver is combined with a vapor-liquid equilibrium model and a moving mesh methodology. The thermodynamic models are based on the cubic equation of state of Soave, Redlich, and Kwong. A compressibility correction for the widely known kωSST turbulence model is implemented additionally. Application-relevant simulations with a total fuel pressure of 300 bars and five different chamber pressures ranging from 12 to 60 bars were defined. Furthermore, the influence of two fuel and chamber temperatures, 294 and 363 K, is analyzed. Depending on the chamber pressure, two different flow structures of the potential core can be distinguished: (1) A series of typical shock barrels for small pressure ratios and moderately underexpanded jets and (2) a shear layer consisting of a two-phase mixture which enfolds the potential core for high pressure ratios and highly underexpanded jets. Increasing the fuel temperature leads to less significant phase separations, while an increase in the chamber pressure does not affect the structure of the potential core. A comparison with experimental measurements shows a very good agreement of the simulated structure of the potential core, providing evidence that the underlying phenomena are predicted correctly and suggesting that a moving mesh strategy and consistent two-phase thermodynamics implementation are necessary for a physical representation of high-pressure injections.

No abstract

No abstract

No abstract