Formation and separation of merged liquid sheets developed from the mixing of coaxial swirling liquid sheets

Sivakumar, D and Raghunandan, BN (2003) Formation and separation of merged liquid sheets developed from the mixing of coaxial swirling liquid sheets. In: Physics of Fluids, 15 (11). pp. 3443-3451.

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Abstract

Liquid–liquid coaxial swirl atomizers are used in liquid rocket engines to achieve an efficient mixing between the fuel and oxidizer sprays. The characteristics of the mixed spray are mainly controlled by the flow behavior of merged liquid sheet originating at the contact point of inner and outer swirling liquid sheets. With an intention of identifying various flow regimes of merged liquid sheet at different conditions of inner and outer liquid sheets, we report here a fundamental experimental investigation on the characteristics of merged liquid sheets using water as the experimental liquid. The physical processes involved in the formation and separation of a merged liquid sheet are described from the experimental measurements. For a given outer liquid sheet condition, the merged liquid sheet forms and separates at specific inner liquid sheet flow conditions. At low outer liquid sheet flow conditions with Weber number less than 50, the merged liquid sheet exhibits a self-sustaining periodic separation process, whose frequency increases with increasing inner liquid sheet Weber number for a given outer liquid sheet Weber number. Experimental measurements are presented to show that the dynamics of the contact point plays a major role in governing the characteristics of merged liquid sheets.

Item Type:	Journal Article
Publication:	Physics of Fluids
Publisher:	American Institute of Physics
Additional Information:	The Copyright belongs to American Institute of Physics.
Department/Centre:	Division of Mechanical Sciences > Aerospace Engineering(Formerly Aeronautical Engineering)
Date Deposited:	05 May 2006
Last Modified:	19 Sep 2010 04:26
URI:	http://eprints.iisc.ac.in/id/eprint/6595

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