Modeling of the non-uniform combustion in a scramjet engine

Due to the high-speed of the air stream, the scramjet combustion is neither uniform nor complete. An empirical fuel distribution model is developed to describe non-uniform combustion for scramjet engines. The combustor is subdivided into different regions by radius with different local equivalence ratios. The conservation equations of the regions for the combustion and exhaust expansion are computed independently. The results indicate that scramjet thrust is more related to the fuel equivalence ratio and combustion efficiency. If the combustion efficiency is 100% and the fuel equivalence ratio is constant, there is no obvious effect of different fuel distribution to the engine except for the exhaust parameter distribution. It is also revealed that the sum of isolator shock loss and combustor Rayleigh loss is nearly constant under the same isolate cross-sectional area. Lower isolator inlet Mach is benefit to the thrust performance and the best thrust performance is at the thermal choking boundary. When the isolator inlet Mach increases, the thrust decreases. (c) 2021 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.