Effect of Mixing on the Anchoring and Combustion Regimes of Pure Hydrogen Flames in Sequential Combustors

In this work, we perform an experimental study of the combustion of pure hydrogen in the sequential stage of a generic combustor. This academic test rig is a simplified model of an industrial sequential combustor. The sequential fuel is injected using different injector geometries. The composition and temperature of the hot stream at the inlet of the sequential burner are defined by the mass flows of the hot combustion products from the first stage (30 kW natural gas–air flame with equivalence ratio of 0.7) and of the dilution air. This temperature is varied between 1100 K and 850 K by modifying the dilution air mass flow in order to study the different combustion regimes of the sequential hydrogen flame. High-speed imaging of OH radicals chemiluminescence is performed with optical emission spectroscopy to measure vitiated gas temperatures. In particular, we investigate the transition from a flame anchored in the sequential combustion chamber, to the situation where it stabilizes upstream into the mixing section, when the inlet flow temperature is increased. Of particular interest is the increasing rate of formation of auto-ignition kernels in this transition process. The underlying combustion regime change is analyzed with 0D reactor simulations, and the limitations of such a simplified low-order model of the flame location are discussed. The effects and importance of the mixing process between fresh fuel and the hot vitiated coflow are examined. Two different injectors are compared under the same operating conditions that create different flow structures along the mixing section. As a result of that, they provide different degrees of mixing between the hydrogen and the hot vitiated flow and allow to demonstrate the impact of mixing quality on the flame morphology.