K. V. Chaudhari, D. B. Kulshreshtha, S.A.

Channiwala/ International Journal of Engineering

Research and Applications (IJERA) ISSN: 2248-9622 www.ijera.com
Vol. 2, Issue 6, November- December 2012, pp.1641-1645

Design and CFD Simulation of Annular Combustion Chamber

with Kerosene as Fuel for 20 kW Gas Turbine Engine
K. V. Chaudhari, D. B. Kulshreshtha, S.A. Channiwala
(Department of Mechanical Engineering, GEC Bharuch, Guj. Tech. University, Gujarat, India
(Department of Mechanical Engineering, C.K.P.C.E.T., Guj. Tech. University, Gujarat, India
(Department of Mechanical Engineering, S. V. N. I. T., Gujarat, India)

ABSTRACT
The challenges in designing high
performance combustion systems have not
changed significantly over the years, but the
approach has shifted towards a more
sophisticated analysis process. A technical
discussion on combustion technology status and
needs will show that the classic impediments
that have hampered progress towards near
stoichiometric combustion still exist. The paper
presents the design for annular combustion
chamber for annular gas turbine for 20 kW
power generation wit kerosene as fuel and its
also include the CFD simulation is carried out
with the CFD tool ANSYS CFX. It also give
results from CFD simulation of temperature
distribution at centerline of liner, at liner wall
and at exit of combustion chamber.

Keywords Annular Combustion Chamber,

CFD, Gas Turbine, Simulation

I. INTRODUCTION
The technical development of industrial
gas turbine gained momentum in the past four
decade. In parallel to the technical development,
new environmental restrictions have been issued.
These restrictions increase considerably the burden
on the designer of gas turbine combustion
chambers. Greater power density, increased output
and cleaner operation have been the central design
goals for gas turbine over the past 25 years, in spite
of the design complexity; gas turbines offer some
clear advantages: high efficiency, low emissions,
low installation cost and low power generation cost
[1].
The combustion chamber of gas turbine
unit is one of the most critical components to be
designed. The reason behind the designing of the
gas turbine combustion chamber being critically
important is a need for stable operation over wide
range of air/fuel ratios. Also there is a close
resemblance among present day combustion
chamber to their predecessors. The present day
combustion chamber exhibits 100% combustion
efficiency over their normal working range
demonstrates substantial reduction in pressure loss
and pollutant emissions and allows a liner life that

is significantly longer than those of many other

engine components [1, 2].
The present paper discusses the design of annular
type combustion chamber for small gas turbine
application. The CFD simulation is carried out for
the designed chamber using commercial CFD tool;
ANSYS CFX.

II. DESIGN [1]

The design of the combustion chamber
was carried out using the initial conditions as
obtained from the compressor outlet. The
combustor design parameters are listed as from
brayton cycle analysis:
Inlet Temperature, T03
: 305 K
Mass Flow Rate of Fuel, mf
: 8.63 x 10-3 kg/s
Inlet Pressure, P03
: 2.95 bar
Mass Flow Rate of Air, ma
: 0.48 kg/s
Fuel/Air Ratio
: 8.63 x 10-3 kg/s
The fuel chosen for the engine was kerosene with
chemical formula C12H24. Other assumed properties
of kerosene are [2]:
Density
: 780 kg/m3
Lower Calorific Value
: 43565 kJ/kg
2.1 Evaluation of Reference Area
The combustion chamber design has to
achieve with many constraints. The overall size is
dictated by compressor and turbine. The combustor
has to depend on the compressor exit conditions
and the combustion exit conditions should decided
on the required turbine inlet conditions for
maximized turbine performance.
The combustion chamber for 20 kW gas turbine
engine is designed using two different
considerations.
2.1.1 Aerodynamics
Aerodynamic process plays a vital role in
the design and performance of gas turbine
combustion systems. It is probably no great
exaggeration to state that when good aerodynamic
design is allied to a matching fuel injection system,
a trouble-free combustor requiring only nominal
development is virtually assured. This means that
aerodynamics leads to thermodynamically ideal
constant pressure combustion.
2.1.2 Chemical

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K. V. Chaudhari, D. B. Kulshreshtha, S.A. Channiwala/ International Journal of Engineering

Research and Applications (IJERA) ISSN: 2248-9622 www.ijera.com
Vol. 2, Issue 6, November- December 2012, pp.1641-1645
Chemical consideration is used to size the
combustion chamber to allow as efficient
combustion as possible. Combustion inefficiency
represents waste of fuel, which is clearly
unacceptable in view of the worlds dwindling oil
supply and escalation of fuel costs. Another
important consideration is that combustion
inefficiency is manifested in the form of
undesirable and harmful pollutant emissions,
notably unburned hydrocarbons and carbon
monoxide. These implications relate the
combustion efficiency with the casing area of the
combustor, which in turn relates it with the liner
diameter and performance of the combustion
chamber. There are three types of controls as far as
combustion is concerned.
1. Reaction Rate Controlled System
2. Mixing Rate Controlled System
3. Evaporation Rate Controlled System
Of the above mentioned controlled system, the
reaction rate controlled system is considered. The
burning velocity model described by Lefebvre [1]
is used to determine the casing area.
The above mentioned considerations of
aerodynamic and chemical will give the reference
areas for the combustion chamber. The reference
area is the casing area for the combustion chamber.
The annulus casing area calculated from the above
criteria is

2.2 Liner Area Calculations

It might appear advantageous to make
liner cross section area as large as possible since
these results in lower velocities and longer
residence time with in the liner, both of which are
highly beneficial to ignition, stability and
combustion efficiency. For a given casing area, the
increase in the liner area can be obtained only with
reduction in annulus area. This raises the annulus
velocity and lowers the annulus static pressure,
thereby reducing the static pressure drop across the
liner holes. This is disadvantageous as high static
pressure drop is required to ensure air jets entering
the liner from adequate penetration and sufficient
turbulence intensity to promote rapid mixing with
the combustion products. A satisfactory criterion
for mixing performance is that ratio of the static

L to the dynamic
pressure drop across the liner
pressure of the flow in the combustion zone

q pz

should be high. If the ratio of the liner cross

sectional area, denoted by

value of

k , then the optimum

k will be such that it gives the highest

pL q pz

value of
.
It can be shown that

2
2

1 msn r 2 1 k 1
T3 k 2
pL
P34

2
q pz
Tpz m 2p qref

1 k

The above equation is used to evaluate

(1)

pL q pz

k by inserting the different parameters.

The optimal value of k is then obtained by

pL q pz
k
in terms of

plotting
against
. Using this criterion
the liner area is calculated as:

2.3 Liner Air Admission Holes

The need of the liner holes is to provide
enough air in the primary zone for complete
combustion primary zone equivalence ratio of 0.9
[3,4,5] selected, to provide enough air to the
cooling the products of combustion and to provide
a uniform temperature profile at the exit in the
dilution zone and to cool the liner wall
configuration.
The diameter of the air admission holes depends on
the maximum penetration required. The effective
diameter of the holes will be calculated by the
following equations:
0.5

jU 2j
Ymax
1.15
sin
U 2
dj
g g

(2)
The number of holes can be calculated using one of
the forms of continuity equation.
.

nd
2
j

15.25 m j
P PL
3
T3

0.5

(3)
The geometrical diameter can be found using the
coefficient of discharge through the air admission
holes.

dh

dj
CD0.5

(4)
For the annular combustion chamber the holes of
primary zone was selected on the basis of no of
fuel injectors used ant they are in double of the no
of fuel injectors for getting uniform temperature
quality at the exit of the chamber.
Using the above mentioned criteria, the number of
holes and their diameter for liner of the annular
combustion chamber for different zones are given
as:
TABLE 1: Geometrical parameters of air
admission holes
Zone
Diameter
Number
Primary
8.42 mm
16
Dilution
12.75 mm
24
Wall cooling
2.527 mm
420

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K. V. Chaudhari, D. B. Kulshreshtha, S.A. Channiwala/ International Journal of Engineering

Research and Applications (IJERA) ISSN: 2248-9622 www.ijera.com
Vol. 2, Issue 6, November- December 2012, pp.1641-1645
2.4 Length of Liner
The length of liner is a function of the
pattern factor and the liner diameter. The length
can be calculated using the following equation:

P
1
LL DL A L ln

q
1 P.F
ref

(5)
Using this equation the liner length is 350 mm. the
other parameters like the diffuser length and area
ratio can be calculated using the continuity
equation. The wireframe model of the combustion
liner is shown in Fig 1.

attainment of large-scale flow recirculation for

flame stabilization, effective dilution of
combustion products, and efficient use of cooling
air along the liner walls.
Successful
aerodynamic
design
demands
knowledge of flow recirculation, jet penetration
and mixing, and discharge coefficients for all types
of air admission holes, including cooling slots.
The study of flow pattern in the combustion
chamber is of vital importance for its successful
operation. Fortunately, recent advancement in
computational fluid dynamics has made it possible
to visualize flow under any condition.
In present study the same approach has been
adopted.
3.2 Combustor Model
`
For the analysis of the combustion
chamber, the commercial CFD code CFX has been
used in order to predict the centerline and the wall
temperature distribution as well as combustion
phenomena.

Figure 1: Wireframe model of Liner

III. METHODOLOGY
The designed annular combustor 3-D
model shown in Fig. 2 is simulated by CFD tool
CFX.

Figure 2: 3-D model of Annular Combustor

Figure 3: Mesh model of Annular Combustor

Grid generation is very important and time
consuming part of the work that has to be done
before starting any CFD calculations. For this
investigation, the grid generation has been done in
CFX- Mesh. The mesh is composed primarily of
tetrahedral mesh elements of the numbers of
elements were about 5,00,000. The mesh size
varies from 0.9 mm at the air admission holes to 6
mm along the length. Fig. 3 shows the generated
mesh of the annular chamber using CFX Mesh.
For the 3D calculations with CFX, the adiabatic
system model was used because of the wall cooled
casing due to large air mass flow.

3.1 Numerical Simulation

A commercial CFD tool ANSYS CFX is
used for the numerical analysis. However, close
inspection suggest that many aerodynamic features
are common to all systems. In the diffuser and
annulus the main objectives are to reduce the flow
velocity and distribute the air in prescribed
amounts to all combustor zones, while maintaining
uniform flow conditions with no parasitic losses or
flow recirculation of any kind. Within the
combustor liner itself, attention is focused on the

3.3 Boundary Conditions

The boundary conditions are given at the
inlet of the diffuser and the fuel injectors. The flow
is allowed to divide itself into liner and casing, and
from casing into different zones through air
admission holes and cooling slots. Such condition
is the exact replica of the real case experimentation,
in which the air is supplied at the inlet diffuser with
known conditions of pressure, temperature and
velocity, and then allowed it to divide by itself
between the casing and the liner.

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K. V. Chaudhari, D. B. Kulshreshtha, S.A. Channiwala/ International Journal of Engineering

Research and Applications (IJERA) ISSN: 2248-9622 www.ijera.com
Vol. 2, Issue 6, November- December 2012, pp.1641-1645
The boundary conditions are mass flow
rate of air at the diffuser inlet as 0.48 kg/s and mass
flow rate of the fuel at the fuel injectors as 8.63 x
10-3 kg/s. The other boundary condition is pressure
of 3 bars at air inlet.
The simulation was specifically targeted
to analyze the flow patterns within the combustion
liner and through different air admission holes,
namely primary zone, dilution zone and wall
cooling and from that study the temperature
distribution in the liner and at walls as well as the
temperature quality at the exit of the combustion
chamber using CFX.

the basis of the fact that in entrance region, first

fuel mixing and evaporation of fuel takes place
thereby indicates reduction in temperature levels,
while as evaporation gets completed and more and
more air is available from air admission holes, the
combustion improves and maxima is reached.

IV. RESULTS
Fig. 4 gives the stream lines for wall
cooling holes. High velocities are found near the
wall regions of the combustion liner.

Figure 6: Temperature profile at the exit of the

Combustor
Fig. 6 shows, the temperature profile at the exit of
the combustor advocates that better mixing in the
dilution zone is achieved but due to the air is not
properly available for combustion of fuel in
primary zone due to less number of primary holes
than fuel injectors not uniform distribution of air
supply achieved through primary holes in the
primary zone found in liner less numbers of holes
in the primary zone.
Figure 4: Streamline through the flow domain
This suggests that the static pressure drop through
wall cooling holes is more. This advocates for redesign of wall cooling slots. Also, the mass flow
rate calculated using CFD is less compared to
design value. This may lead to higher liner wall
temperatures.

Figure 5: Temperature distribution along the length

of liner
Fig. 5 gives temperature distribution in liner, in the
entrance region of the combustor, the temperature
levels are slightly lower and thereafter increases
and reaches maximum and thereafter again
decreases. This phenomenon can be explained on

V. CONCLUSIONS
The design of combustion chamber and
numerical investigations carried out of annular type
combustor. The k- model used for analysis [6, 7]
and also the mean temperature, reaction rate, and
velocity fields are almost insensitive to the grid
size [8]. The streamlines from wallcooling holes
are not provide proper wallcooling suggest
redesign of it. The temperature profile in the
annular type combustion chamber is not uniform at
exit of the combustor but form Fig. 5 dilution is
achieved better so not uniform distribution of air
takes place near all fuel injectors in primary zone
which suggest primary holes are taken twice the
number of injectors so uniform air distribution near
each injectors and uniform temperature distribution
at exit of chamber was achieved
The numerical simulation state that the
flame was touching the liner so chances of burning
of combustor is possible if it is made which suggest
that durability of chamber liner is decrease.

REFERENCES
[1]

Lefebvre A.H., Gas Turbine Combustion

Chamber (2nd ed., USA: Taylor and
Francis, 1999).

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K. V. Chaudhari, D. B. Kulshreshtha, S.A. Channiwala/ International Journal of Engineering

Research and Applications (IJERA) ISSN: 2248-9622 www.ijera.com
Vol. 2, Issue 6, November- December 2012, pp.1641-1645
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[3]

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