Early results of a study to simulate combustion in a chamber and its interaction with an engine’s compressor and turbine are being transferred to the private sector five years into an 11-year project funded by Germany’s Research Foundation.
Involving up to 25 doctoral students in any year, the project has validated a gaseous fuel model against the combustion chamber it simulated. The chamber was instrumented with laser diagnostic equipment to enable precise measurements of its performance, so the computer model can be benchmarked against it.
Good results from the benchmarking means industry can now begin to benefit. Rolls-Royce Deutschland is the industrial partner. “The transfer is already starting, we are transferring the results now and there will be additional steps. In the future this technology could dramatically reduce engine development time and enhance pollution reduction,” says Technical University of Darmstadt’s professor of energy and powerplant technology Johannes Janicka, who is co-operating with researchers at the UK’s University of Cambridge.
The Flow and Combustion in Future Gas Turbine Combustion Chambers project, which is receiving €1.5 million ($1.75 million) in funding a year, is also known as SFB568. Janicka adds that a limitation on the research is computing access because the project’s simulation needs to run a super-computer for two months at a time. This is difficult as the computer has to be shared with other projects.
However, in the future a company’s in-house computers should be able to run the models in one to three days.
Source: Flight International
