Large Eddy Simulation of a Gas-Turbine Combustor Using 2-Scalar Flamelet Approach

To investigate the ability of a numerical prediction method in a practical combustor system, we have conducted a numerical simulation of partially premixed turbulent combustion within a gas-turbine combustor geometry. A combination of Large-Eddy simulation and the 2-scalar flamelet approach are used to simulate unsteady turbulent combustion in modeling turbulent and combustion reaction phenomena and their interactions. With the successful simulation of both the premixed and non-premixed combustion states including the effects of turbulence, the predicted distributions of time-averaged temperature and the O₂ mole fraction are found to essentially correspond to the experimental data. In an analysis of the predicted results, the weights of resolved and unresolved phenomena in the numerical prediction are estimated in order to discuss the effects of the turbulent combustion model applied to a practical combustion flow. The analysis determines the effect of turbulence on a Grid Scale that accelerates the premixed combustion reaction, while the modeled effect of turbulence caused by combustion acceleration as shown on a Sub-grid Scale is about twice of the effect as that seen on the Grid Scale.