Development and application of the drop number size moment modelling to spray combustion simulations

This work presents the development and implementation of spray combustion modelling based on the spray size distribution moments. In this spray model, the droplet size distribution of spray is characterised by the first four moments related to number, radius, surface-area and volume of droplets, respectively. The governing equations for gas phase and liquid phase employed are solved by the finite volume method based on an Eulerian framework. These constructed equations and source terms are derived based on the moment-average quantities which are the key concept for this work. The sub-model employed for ignition and combustion is the coupling reaction rate between Arrhenius model and Eddy Break-Up model (EBU) via a reaction progress variable. The results obtained from simulation are compared with the experimental and simulation data in the literature in order to assess the accuracy of present model. Comparing with the experimental results, present approach is capable to provide a qualitatively reasonable prediction for auto-ignition. In addition, the flame area developed during the combustion progress corresponds with the experimental data. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.