Title

Infrared thermography and numerical study of vaporization characteristics of pure and blended bio-fuel droplets

Authors

Authors

A. Saha; R. Kumar;S. Basu

Comments

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Abbreviated Journal Title

Int. J. Heat Mass Transf.

Keywords

Multi-component droplets; Bio-fuel; IR thermography; Levitated droplet; EVAPORATION; COMBUSTION; STREAM; SPRAYS; HEAT; Thermodynamics; Engineering, Mechanical; Mechanics

Abstract

The combustion dynamics and stability are dependent on the quality of mixing and vaporization of the liquid fuel in the pre-mixer. The vaporization characteristics of different blends of bio-fuel droplets injected into the air stream in the pre-mixer have been modeled. Two major alternate fuels analyzed are ethanol and Rapeseed Methyl Esters (RME). Ethanol is being used as a substitute of gasoline, while RME has been considered as an alternative for diesel. In the current work, the vaporization characteristics of a single droplet in a simple pre-mixer has been studied for pure ethanol and RME in a hot air jet at a temperature of 800 K. In addition, the behavior of the fuels when they are mixed with conventional fuels like gasoline and diesel is also studied. Temperature gradients and vaporization efficiency for different blends of bio-conventional fuel mixture are compared with one another. Smaller droplets vaporize faster than larger droplets ensuring homogenous mixture. The model was validated using an experiment involving convection heating of acoustically levitated fuel droplets and IR-thermography to visualize and quantify the vaporization characteristics of different bio-fuel blends downstream of the pre-mixer. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Journal Title

International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer

Volume

53

Issue/Number

19-20

Publication Date

1-1-2010

Document Type

Article

Language

English

First Page

3862

Last Page

3873

WOS Identifier

WOS:000280484400028

ISSN

0017-9310

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