Combustion heat release effects on asymmetric vortex shedding from bluff bodies

This thesis describes an investigation of oscillatory combustion processes due to vortex shedding from bluff body flame holders. The primary objective of this study was to elucidate the influence of combustion process heat release upon the Benard-von Karman (BVK) instability in reacting bluff body wakes. For this purpose, spatial and temporal heat release distributions in bluff body-stabilized combustion of liquid Jet-A fuel with high-temperature, vitiated air were characterized over a wide range of operating conditions. Two methods of fuel injection were investigated. In the first method, referred to as close-coupled fuel injection, the fuel was supplied via discrete liquid jets injected perpendicular to the cross-flowing air stream just upstream of the bluff body trailing edge, thereby limiting fuel and air mixing prior to burning. The fuel was introduced well upstream (∼0.5 m) of the bluff body in the second fuel injection mode, resulting in a well-evaporated and mixed reactants stream. The resulting BVK heat release dynamics were compared between these fuel injection modes in order to investigate their dependence upon the spatial distributions of fuel-air ratio and heat release in the reacting wake.;When close-coupled fuel injection was used, the BVK heat release dynamics increased in amplitude with increasing global equivalence ratio, reaching a maximum just before globally rich blow out of the combustion process occurred. This was due to a decrease in fuel entrainment into the near-wake as the fuel spray penetrated further into the cross-flow, which reduced the local heat release and equivalence ratio (indicated by CH* and C2*/CH* chemiluminescence, respectively). As a result, the density gradient across the near-wake reaction zone decreased, resulting in less damping of vorticity due to dilatation. In addition, unburned reactants were entrained into the recirculation zone due to the injection of discrete liquid fuel jets in close proximity to the wake. This reduced the temperature of the recirculating gases further, resulting in large (i.e., near-unity) products-to-reactants density ratios in the near-wake.;When the fuel was introduced upstream of the bluff body, the BVK heat release dynamics significantly decreased in amplitude. In this case the fuel was, in all likelihood, fully evaporated and well-mixed with the air prior to burning, resulting in greater amounts of fuel entrainment and subsequent heat release in the near-wake than in the close-coupled fuel injection case. In addition, the heat release was distributed more uniformly across the combustor span, which led to stronger density gradients across the near-wake reaction zone than in close-coupled-fuelled flames due to a lack of reactants entrainment into the recirculation zone. This enhanced the damping of vorticity due to dilatation, which inhibited the formation and shedding of the large-scale, coherent vortices. When the local density gradient was large enough, the BVK instability was completely suppressed.;A parallel, linear stability analysis was performed in order to further understand the influence of the near-wake combustion process heat release upon the wake instability characteristics. The results of this analysis indicate that the products-to-reactants density and velocity ratios in the near-wake are the primary parameters controlling the onset of local absolute instability (a necessary condition for the global, BVK instability) in reacting wakes. Upon comparing these results to the measured data, absolute instability was predicted for all operating conditions in which relatively high-amplitude BVK heat release dynamics were observed. This was the case for close-coupled fuel injection at all global equivalence ratios, as well as upstream fuel injection at lean equivalence ratios, due to the low temperature rise across the reacting shear layers in these cases. Only upstream fuel injection at near stoichiometric fuel-air ratios resulted in local products-to-reactants density ratios low enough to suppress absolute instability and, thus, BVK vortex shedding.;The results of this study support the postulate that sinuous heat release fluctuations due to BVK vortex shedding are the result of local absolute instability in the near-wake, which is eliminated only if the temperature rise across the reacting shear layers is sufficiently high. Furthermore, this thesis demonstrates that non-uniform fuelling of the near-wake reaction zone increases the likelihood of absolute instability due to the possibility of near-unity products-to-reactants density ratios locally, as was the case for close-coupled fuel injection at high global equivalence ratios. In fact, high-amplitude BVK heat release dynamics were observed in close-coupled-fuelled flames at global operating conditions in which premixed flames were stable. Therefore, knowledge of the local thermal-fluid properties in the near-wake reaction zone is necessary to predict the onset of the absolutely unstable, BVK mode in reacting bluff body wakes. This is particularly true of partially-premixed and liquid-fuelled systems, in which spatial variations in fuel-air ratio and heat release are likely.