SIMPLIFIED JET FUEL REACTION MECHANISM FOR LEAN BURN COMBUSTION APPLICATION

Chi-Ming Lee and Krishna Kundu

National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Lewis Research Center
Cleveland, Ohio 44135

and

Bahman Ghorashi
Cleveland State University
Cleveland, Ohio 44115

Abstract mechanism. These differential equations are usually stiff

and require special integration techniques. In addition,
Successful modeling of combustion and emissions in the specific rate constants of the elementary reactions
gas turbine engine combustors requires an adequate either are not available in the literature, or are not nec-
description of the reaction mechanism. For hydrocarbon essarily well known and can be a potential source of
b- oxidation, detailed mechanisms are only available for error. The present kinetic mechanisms attempt to
the simplest types of hydrocarbons such as methane, simplify the chemistry in order to predict quantities of
ethane, acetylene, and propane. 1'2 These detailed mech- interest, such as heat release rates, flame temperature,
anisms contain a large number of chemical species par- and concentration of important principal species such as
ticipating simultaneously in many elementary kinetic unburned hydrocarbons, CO, and CO 2.
steps. Current computational fluid dynamic (CFD)
models must include fuel vaporization, fuel-air mix- The simplified Jet-A chemical kinetics mechanism is
ing, chemical reactions, and complicated boundary based on the modified Arrhenius equation,
geometries.
k = AT" exp (-E/RT)
(1)
To simulate these conditions a very sophisticated
computer model is required, which requires large com-
puter memory capacity and long run times. Therefore, where the rate k depends on the temperature T, tem-
gas turbine combustion modeling has frequently been perature exponent n, an activation energy E, and a
simplified by using global reaction mechanisms, which pre-exponential collision frequency factor A. The
can predict only the quantities of interest: heat release simplest Jet-A reaction mechanism is the one-step
rates, flame temperature, and emissions. mechanism:

Jet fuels are wide-boiling-range hydrocarbons with C13H26 + 19.50 2 _ 13CO 2 + 13H20
ranges extending through those of gasoline and kerosene. (2)
These fuels are chemically complex, often containing A n E(Kcal/kg mol)
more than 300 components. Jet fuel typically can be
7.5×1010 0 41 000
characterized as containing 75 vol _0 paraffin compounds
and 25 vol % aromatic compounds. A five-step Jct-A
fuel mechanism which involves pyrolysis and subsequent The activation energy E value of 41 000 Kcal/kg tool
oxidation of paraffin and aromatic compounds is pre- has been reported by Freeman and Lefebvre 3 for kero-
sented here. This mechanism is verified by comparing sene fuel. The collision frequency factor A value of
with Jet-A fuel ignition delay time experimental data, 7.5 × 101° has been determined by comparison with Jet-A
and species concentrations obtained from flametube fuel ignition delay time data. A slightly more complex
experiments. This five-step mechanism appears to be mechanism is the two-step mechanism, which is very
better than the current one- and two-step mechanisms. similar to what was proposed by Edelman and Fortune: 4

C13H26 + 130 2 --4 13CO + 13H20

Introduction
(3)
A n E(Kcal/kg mol)
Jet fuel oxidation involves a very large number of
3.37x1011 0 41 000
reaction species,thus a large number of differential
equations are required to develop an acceptablekinetic