The design of a combustion test facility for synthetic jet fuel research

With the relatively recent emergence of non-petroleum-derived aviation gas turbine fuels, it was appropriate to review the complete list of jet-fuel specifications to assess whether they were sufficiently robust to ensure fit-forpurpose within the new paradigm. Although this has been an industry-wide endeavour, there were some particular research areas that were identified for special in-house attention by Sasol, as the world’s first commercial producer of approved and certified semi-synthetic and fully synthetic jet fuel. The project described in this report formed part of one of these research areas, which pertained to ignition and combustion stability in gas turbines and the role played by various fuel attributes and properties. The project was conducted at the Sasol Advance Fuels Laboratory based at the University of Cape Town. The project entailed the design and construction of a combustion test facility for conducting synthetic jet fuel research. The primary intended focus of the facility was the investigation of ignition and combustion stability behaviour of various test fuels, ranging from commercial jet fuel to single component model fuels. The scope of the project also included the design of both a basic homogeneous and a heterogeneous combustor which served to verify the facility’s suitability for investigating the influence of fuel chemistry and combustor inlet conditions on ignition and combustion stability limits.

Grantor dc:publisher.institution

Department of Mechanical Engineering

Year dc:date.issued

2009

Author dc:creator

• Burger, Victor

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Yates, Andrew

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/11427/9495

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/9495