Jet A Combustion in a Mesoscale Swirl-Stabilized Combustor Array

We investigate the use of Jet A fuel in a mesoscale burner array, developed to improve small-scale flame stability and reduce combustor length scale. Jet A is vaporized before being mixed with air to produce premixed Jet A-air flame arrays. The reactant mixture temperature is controlled by a heater to study the effects of mixture temperature on flame stability. Overall combustion characteristics of Jet A and methane are compared on the mesoscale burner array. The Jet A flame array exhibited a higher lean blow-off equivalence ratio than that of the methane flame array under a range of inlet temperatures varying from 373.15 to 773.15 K. The heated Jet A fuel composition is analyzed using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry. 10 kHz planar laser-induced fluorescence (PLIF) imaging of the hydroxyl radical (OH) is employed to visualize the post-combustion zone of the Jet A flame array using filtered separation of Jet A fluorescence. From the OH-PLIF images, the Jet A flame array showed narrower flame structures and smaller recirculation zones compared to that of the methane flame under the same operating condition. Furthermore, the Jet A flame array showed larger flame fluctuations compared to that of the methane flame at an equivalence ratio of 0.8 based on proper orthogonal decomposition analysis. These results can be extended toward designing and operating other small-scale combustion systems using heavy hydrocarbon liquid fuels.