Computation of turbulent evaporating sprays with well-specified measurements: A sensitivity study on droplet properties

An extensive numerical study was carried out for a confined evaporating spray in a turbulent, heated gas flow using a published well-defined experimental dataset. The Eulerian-Lagrangian stochastic models were employed for spray calculations wherein the gas turbulence was modeled using the second-moment transport model for the Reynolds stresses and heal-fur vectors, and the droplet dispersion was modeled using the Lagrangian stochastic models with or without temporal correlations. Two fashions of the infinite-conduction-evaporation model were studied, both of which have taken into account the variable gas-film properties by the 1/3-rule. Numerical results for the droplet phase, i.e., the mean diameters, mass fluxes, mean and fluctuating velocities were presented and discussed by comparison with the experimental data. The sensitivity of various droplet properties to the number of droplet trajectories at the inlet, the drift correction approaches for the improvement of mass-flux predictions, and the evaporation models was investigated in terms of the well-defined experimental dataset. Results show that the droplet mean velocities are generally not sensitive to all the factors considered, that droplet r.m.s. velocities downstream are sensitive to the number of trajectories, that the droplet mass-flux accumulation near the centreline can be substantially improved by using a new drift correction approach, and that mass-flux predictions are sensitive to the evaporation models.