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In this study, we apply particle image velocimetry (PIV), hot-wire anemometry (HWA), and large-eddy simulation (LES) to identify and characterize a key mechanism by which high-intensity turbulence measured in the “Hi-Pilot” burner is generated. Large-scale oscillation of the high-velocity jet core about its own mean axial centerline is identified as a dominant feature of the turbulent flow field produced by this piloted Bunsen burner. This oscillation is linked to unsteady flow separation along the expanding section of the reactant nozzle and appears stochastic in nature. It occurs over a range of frequencies (100–300 Hz) well below where the turbulent kinetic energy (TKE) spectrum begins to follow a – 5/3 power law and results in a flow with significant scale separation in the TKE spectrum. Although scale separation and intermittency are not unusual in turbulent flows, this insight should inform analysis and interpretation of previous, and future studies of this unique test case.

The heat release distribution, combustion instability characteristics and flow dynamics of lean swirl-stabilized flames of hydrogen enriched natural gas were studied using time-resolved (10 kHz) stereo PIV, OH* chemiluminescence imaging and acoustic pressure measurements. The technically premixed gas turbine model combustor was operated at elevated pressure up to 5 bar with preheated air. The H2 vol. fraction in the fuel was varied up to 50%. An M-shaped aerodynamically stabilized flame persisted at 1 bar up to low H2 enrichment ratios. Increasing H2 enrichment caused the M-flame to first transition to a bistable flame then to a shear layer stabilized V-flame. Increasing pressure and H2 enrichment both decreased the flame length. The combustion instability frequency and thermoacoustic amplitude varied and were mapped across operating conditions. The effect of H2 enrichment on the thermoacoustic amplitude was explained by examining the convective coupling between the Helmholtz acoustics and heat release. H2 enrichment was shown to increase the phase delay between the pressure and heat release by decreasing the pressure wave travel times in the plenum and swirler sections of the burner and by decreasing the flame length while simultaneously increasing the pressure wave speed within the burner. Thus H2 enrichment increased the thermoacoustic amplitude when the phase delay at the initial condition was negative, and decreased it when the initial phase delay was positive. Flow dynamics were studied by characterizing the precessing vortex core frequency and energy. The PVC structure existed across all conditions, and its frequency reduced to a different Strouhal number for the M-flame and V-flame. H2 enrichment consistently slightly decreased the PVC energy.

Abstract In this paper, an experimental study of the non-reacting turbulent flow field characteristics of a piloted premixed Bunsen burner designed for operational at elevated pressure conditions is presented. The generated turbulent flow fields were experimentally investigated at atmospheric and elevated pressure by means of high-speed particle image velocimetry (PIV). The in-nozzle flow through the burner was computed using large-eddy simulation (LES), and the turbulent flow field predicted at the burner exit was compared against the experimental results. The findings show that the burner yields a reasonably homogeneous, nearly isotropic turbulence at the nozzle exit with highly reproducible boundary conditions that can be well predicted by numerical simulations. Similar levels of turbulence intensities and turbulent length scales were obtained at varied pressures and bulk velocities with turbulent Reynolds numbers up to 5300. This work demonstrates the burner’s potential for the study of premixed flames subject to intermediate and extreme turbulence at the elevated pressure conditions found in gas turbine combustors. Graphical abstract

We study the impact of H2 enrichment on the unsteady flow dynamics and thermoacoustic instability in the single nozzle PRECCINSTA swirl combustor. We analyze data from two operating modes, premixed (PM) and technically premixed (TPM). The experiments were performed at atmospheric conditions with H2/CH4 fuel mixtures at a global equivalence ratio of 0.65 while maintaining a constant thermal power of 20 kW. We examine the effect of H2 addition on the flow dynamics by analyzing cases with three fuel compositions: 0% H2, 20% H2 and 50% H2 in both operating modes. A new multi resolution modal decomposition method, using a combination of wavelet transforms and proper orthogonal decomposition (WPOD) of the experimental time resolved high speed flow velocity and OH-PLIF measurements is performed. Thermoacoustic oscillations are observed in the TPM operating mode alone. WPOD results for the 0% H2 TPM operating mode case reveals intermittent helical PVC oscillations along with axi-symmetric hydrodynamic flow oscillations due to the thermoacoustic oscillation. These oscillations cause local flame extinction near the nozzle centrebody resulting in liftoff. A precessing vortex core (PVC) oscillation develops in the flow that enables intermittent flame reattachment and results in intermittent thermoacoustic oscillations in this case. In the 0% H2 PM case, the flame remains lifted off of the centrebody despite the presence of PVC oscillations in this case as well. H2 enrichment results in the suppression of flame lift-off and the PVC in both operating modes. We show from flow strain rate statistics and extinction strain rate calculations that the increase of the latter with H2 addition, allows the flame to stabilize in the region near the centrebody where the pure CH4 cases show lift off. The lack of thermoacoustic oscillations in the PM operating mode shows that the primary heat release driving mechanism is due to fuel-air ratio oscillation that the thermoacoustic oscillation generates. The time averaged flow fields and the emergence of the PVC when the flame is lifted off, together suggest that PVC oscillations are caused by the separation between the vortex breakdown bubble and the wake behind the centrebody, as suggested by prior computational studies.

This article presents a comparison of measurement methods for current and voltage distortions in low-voltage networks in the frequency range from 2 to 150 kHz (supraharmonics). The comparison encompasses the methods informatively described in IEC and CISPR international standards, as well as other innovative techniques presented in the literature. This work is carried out within a novel framework that includes advanced and complex synthetic test signals, as well as real grid recordings that allow an accurate comparison of the performance of the tested methods. Specifically designed indices are employed to characterize the accuracy of the tested methods in the frequency and amplitude assessments. In light of that, the strengths and weaknesses of the methods are identified. The results of this article contribute to the ongoing standardization work carried out by the IEC SC77A/WG9 with the purpose of defining a normative measurement method suitable for assessing grid disturbance levels in the range from 2 to 150 kHz. This project (18NRM05) has received funding from the EMPIR programme co-financed by the Participating States and from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme. This work was funded in part by the Spanish Government under Grant RTI2018-099162-B-I00 (MCIU/AEI/FEDER-UE). The Associate Editor coordinating the review process was Dimitrios Georgakopoulos.

Global instabilities in swirling flows can significantly alter the flame and flow dynamics of swirl-stabilized flames, such as those in modern power generation gas turbine engines. In this study, we characterize the interaction between the precessing vortex core (PVC), which is the consequence of a global hydrodynamic instability, and thermoacoustic instabilities, which are the result of a resonant coupling between combustor acoustics and the unsteady heat release rate of combustion. This characterization is performed using experimental data obtained from a model gas turbine combustor system employing two concentric swirling nozzles of air, separated by a ring of fuel injectors, operating at 5 bar pressure. The flow split between the two streams is systematically varied to observe the impact of flow structure variation on the flow and flame dynamics. High-speed sPIV, OH-PLIF, and acetone PLIF are used to obtain information about the velocity fields, flame, and fuel flow behavior, respectively. Spectral POD and spatial frequency analysis are used to identify and characterize the dominant oscillation mechanisms driving the system. Three dominant modes are seen: two thermoacoustic modes and the precessing vortex core. Our results show that in the cases where the frequency of the PVC overlaps with either of the thermoacoustic modes, the thermoacoustic modes are suppressed. A weakly nonlinear asymptotic analysis shows that the suppression of the axisymmetric shear layer shedding, and hence thermoacoustic mode, is the result of a nonlinear coupling between the PVC and the axisymmetric mode of the swirling jet. Evolution equations for both the symmetric and PVC modes are derived to show the controlling parameters that drive this suppression. We conclude by discussing ways in which thermoacoustic instability suppression can be achieved through combustor flow field design., 30 pages, 14 figures, 3 appendix sections

This paper reports one-month 3 kHz EM disturbances recorded at Kardamas, Ilia, Greece after a strong M L = 6 . 6 earthquake occurred on 2018/10/25 near Zakynthos and Ilia. During this period 17 earthquakes occurred with magnitudes M L = 4 . 5 and M L = 5 . 5 and depths between 3 km and 17 km, all near Zakynthos and Ilia. A two-stage, fully computational methodology was applied to the outcomes of five different time-evolving chaos analysis techniques (DFA, fractal dimension analysis through Higuchi, Katz and Sevcik methods and power-law analysis). Via literature-based thresholds, the out-of-threshold results of all chaos analysis methods were located and from these, the common time instances of 13 selected combinations per five, four, three and two methods. Numerous persistent segments were located with DFA exponents between 1 . 6 &le, &alpha, &le, 2 . 0 , fractal dimensions between 1 . 4 &le, D &le, 2 . 0 and power-law exponents between 2 . 2 &le, &beta, 3 . 0 . Out of the 17 earthquakes, six earthquakes were jointly matched by 13 selected combinations of five, four, three and two chaos analysis methods, four earthquakes by all combinations of four, three and two, while the remaining seven earthquakes were matched by at least one combination of three methods. All meta-analysis matches are within typical forecast periods.

This paper presents a data-driven identification framework with the objective to retrieve a flame model from the nonlinear limit cycle. The motivation is to identify a flame model for configurations, which do not allow the determination of the flame dynamics: that is commonly for industrial applications where (i) optical access for non-intrusive measurements of velocity and heat release fluctuations are not feasible and (ii) unstable combustion is monitored via multiple pressure recordings. To demonstrate the usefulness of the method, we chose three test cases: (i) a classical Rijke tube; (ii) an experiment of a laminar flame (EM2C case) (iii) and a high-pressure, turbulent premixed flame (DLR case). The procedure is as follows: First, acoustic network models for the three cases are generated for which the in-house software taX is employed. Next, the acoustic network models are embedded in an optimization framework with the objective to identify flame parameters that match the experimental limit cycle data: based on the instability frequency and pressure amplitudes, we formulate physical constraints and an objective function in order to identify the flame model parameters gain nopt and time delay τopt in the nonlinear regime. We demonstrate for the three cases that the identified flame parameters reproduce the unstable combustion processes and highlight the usefulness of the method for control purposes.

The mechanisms of flame blowout under pressure gradient effects are explored for a bluff-body stabilized flame. The blowout process is induced through equivalence ratio reduction from a lean stabilized flame to complete blowout. Simultaneous high-speed particle image velocimetry (PIV) and C2*/CH* chemiluminescence imaging diagnostics are used to obtain the instantaneous flame structure, vorticity field, equivalence ratio, and local strain rate during the extinction process. The goal is to elucidate the effect of flame-generated vorticity on lean flame extinction. Three test-sections configured as a nozzle, a rectangular duct, and a diffuser, are used to alter the downstream pressure gradient yielding high, nominal, and low magnitudes of flame-generated baroclinic torque. For all three configurations, the flame brush narrows and the shear layer vorticity expands in the transverse direction resulting in flame-shear interactions and extinction. The flame-shear layer interaction increases the strain rate along the flame; however, the strong flame-generated vorticity for the nozzle case delayed the strain rate increase by keeping the flame away from the shear layer the longest. The sharp increase in the Karlovitz number above unity caused by the sudden increase in the strain rate corresponds to the time of flame brush contraction and shear layer width expansion. It is shown that the downstream pressure gradient can either augment or attenuate the time required for the Karlovitz number to reach a critical value of unity, which is associated with local extinctions along the flame. In all of the test-section configurations, the flame-generated vorticity has a weak influence on the Benard von Karman (BVK) instability mode and its harmonics. The Strouhal number during blow-out remained relatively constant in all of the cases showing greater sensitivity to the shear layer length than to the BVK frequency.

Flame–flame interaction events occur frequently in turbulent premixed flames and change the local structure and dynamics of flames. It is essential to understand these flame–flame interaction events to develop high-fidelity combustion models for use in modern combustion devices. In this study, we experimentally investigate the topology of flame–flame interaction events in single- and multi-flame configurations. A dual-burner experiment is probed with high-speed OH-planar laser-induced fluorescence and stereoscopic-particle image velocimetry to obtain simultaneous flame front locations and velocity fields. A non-rigid image registration technique is implemented to track the topological changes occurring in these flames. In both single- and dual-flame configurations, small-scale interactions occur more frequently compared to large-scale interactions, and statistics show that most of the reactant-side interactions contribute to large flame surface destructions than the product-side interactions. It is also found that turbulence length- and velocity-scales can play an important role in facilitating the interaction events and pocket formations from these events. Filamentarity is used to quantify the two-dimensional shape of these interactions and comparisons are made between the orientation and shape of interaction events and the local turbulence in the flowfield. Alignment between the orientation of the interaction shapes and the principal strain rates show that compressive fluid forces drive both types of interaction events.

The PRECCINSTA GTMC was studied at elevated pressure and power density with 6 kHz stereoscopic particle image velocimetry (SPIV), OH* chemiluminescence (CL), and 100 kHz dynamic pressure measurements. This technically premixed, swirl stabilized flame exhibited self-excited thermoacoustic oscillations with limit-cycle behavior. A helical precessing vortex core (PVC) was detected within the inner shear layer, between the central recirculation bubble (CRB) and the reactant jets. The PVC was found to be the delineating flow feature for combustion dynamics even at elevated pressure. Sparse dynamic mode decomposition (DMD) of the velocity fields deconvolved the dynamics into a thermoacoustic and PVC mode. The precession of the PVC was at a non-harmonic frequency to the thermoacoustic oscillations, and at least twice that of findings at atmospheric conditions. Nevertheless, the continuous and persistent structure of the PVC allows it promote unsteady heat release to sustain the thermoacoustic cycle. The three dimensional structure of the reactant jets, central recirculation bubble, and PVC was reconstructed by double phase conditioning the reconstructed velocity field. The surface of the CRB was observed to transition between asymmetric and symmetric states depending on the thermoacoustic phase. Analysis of the swirling strength values on the CRB surface indicates the interaction strength between the hydrodynamic structures of the PVC and CRB. When this coupling is large, the heat release determined by the mean OH*-CL intensity is maximum. These findings indicate a critical role of the PVC and CRB interaction on combustion in unstable swirl flames at conditions closer to those found in a modern gas turbine engine.

The mechanisms of transient formation and oxidation of soot in an aero-engine model combustor at elevated pressure are studied for the first time using a combination of high-speed simultaneous stereo-PIV and OH-PLIF and results from a recent detailed LES. A combined analysis of experiment and LES shows that the highly transient and intermittent evolution of soot in this combustor is governed by an unsteady interplay of distinct pockets of burned gas in the inner recirculation zone (IRZ) with either relatively rich or relatively lean composition. The former originate from reaction of fuel-rich unburned gas, whereas the latter result from additional admixture of secondary air further downstream. The analysis further enables distinction and localization of premixed and diffusion-type flame fronts within the flame zone. The time-resolved complementary measurements of velocity field and flame structure allow accurate tracking of both the burned gas pockets and soot filaments. It is seen that soot generally forms in the rich pockets if their residence time in the IRZ is sufficient, whereas oxidation occurs in the lean zones carrying OH. Correlating the dynamics of flow field and soot indicates that the intermittency of soot is driven by an intermittent flow of lean burned gas into the IRZ that affects the residence time of rich pockets. The results suggest that the formation of soot might be further reduced by a proper adjustment of secondary air injection aiming at a sufficient and more constant recirculation of lean burned gas. A remarkably good agreement of measured and simulated instantaneous flame structures is observed, indicating that flow field and gas-phase reactions are well predicted by the LES. The experimental insights into the transient mechanisms of soot formation and oxidation, on the other hand, may provide useful input for LES soot models where deviations from measurements are generally larger.

For the detailed understanding of transient combustion processes, in particular, of auto-ignition, quantitative measurements with high spatio-temporal resolution are desirable. These can, for instance, serve as validation data for time-resolved numerical simulations and in particular for the combustion models used in those simulations. In the current study, a jet-in-hot-coflow (JHC) burner, developed at the German Aerospace Center (DLR), the DLR JHC, was used to inject a turbulent methane jet into the hot exhaust gas of a lean hydrogen/air flame, and a steady state jet flame was established. In addition, fuel could be injected in a transient manner. Here, an auto-igniting jet was observed. The flame stabilization of the steady state jet flame and the auto-ignition during transient fuel injection were studied using high-speed laser-based and optical measurements. A strategy for quantifying high-speed OH planar laser-induced fluorescence is presented, and the measurement uncertainties are evaluated. The flame stabilization mechanism in steady state jet flames was assessed using probability density functions of the OH concentration at different axial and radial locations. The formation of auto-ignition kernels during transient fuel injection is evaluated based on time series of the OH concentration. It is shown how the OH concentration levels and PDF shapes can be used to characterize the chemical state of the reacting flow and to distinguish between auto-ignition and flame propagation.

Single-laser-shot temperature measurements at 5 kHz were performed in a model gas turbine combustor using femtosecond (fs) coherent anti-Stokes Raman scattering (CARS). The combustor was operated at a global equivalence ratio of 0.65 and 10 kW thermal power. Measurements were performed at various locations within the flame in order to resolve the spatial flame structure and compare to previously published studies. Power spectral density analysis of the temperature measurements yielded the characteristic thermo-acoustic pulsation frequency previously reported at 308 Hz. These results demonstrate the usefulness of fs-CARS for the investigation of highly turbulent combustion phenomena. The spatial resolution of the single-laser shot temperature measurements was approximately 600 μm, the precision was approximately ±2%, and the estimated accuracy was approximately ±3%. The dynamic range was sufficient for temperature measurements ranging from 300 K to 2400 K, although some detector saturation was observed for low temperature spectra.