COMPREHENSIVE JP-8 MECHANISM FOR VITIATED FLOWS

Despite the importance of jet fighter afterburner designs, there exists very little data on the majority of the individual components of jet fuel, especially JP-8, to enable development of a detailed kinetic mechanism. Although the Multi University Research Initiative program has been initiated for that purpose, it is oriented for the main engine combustor where the process is different from afterburners. A kinetic mechanism for combustion in afterburners raises new level of complexities since the combustion is vitiated: low pressure, minimal oxygen, and high temperature. Innovative Energy Solution is assembling a world class team of experts in chemical kinetics and computational fluid dynamic to develop a robust and sophisticated chemical kinetics module for predicting elementary reactions of vitiated combustion as exist in afterburner environments. This module, for eventual insertion into a computational fluid dynamic package, will go beyond simple chemistry as it will predict relevant micro level chemical reactions during combustion in vitiated flow. Using the unique properties of the single pulse shock tube to generate the needed low pressure rate coefficients, the company is planning an array of experiments for validating and cross-validating the model while taking a lead in defining the fluid dynamic portion of the problem.