Multi-objective Numerical Investigation of a Generic Airblast Injector Design

In combustor design for aero-engines, engineers face multiple opposing objectives with strict constraints. The trend toward lean direct injection (LDI) combustors suggests a growing emphasis on injector design to balance these objectives. Decades of empirical and analytical work have produced low-order methods, including semi-empirical and semi-analytical correlations and models of combustors and their components, but detailed modeling of injector and combustor behavior requires computational fluid dynamics (CFD). In this study, an application of low-order methods and published guidelines yielded generic injector and combustor geometries, as well as CFD boundary conditions of parameterized injector designs. Moreover, semi-empirical correlations combined with a numerical spray combustion solver provided injector design evaluations in terms of pattern factor, thermoacoustic performance, and certain emissions. Automation and parallel coordinate visualization enabled exploration of the dual-swirler airblast injector design space, which is often neglected in published combustor design studies.