Swirl cups (hybrid atomizers) are being widely employed in aero gas turbine engine combustors for their established merits in terms of achieving satisfactory atomization over the entire combustor operating regime. Even though several investigators have worked on development of these swirl cups, there is a scanty data reported in literature relevant to their design.
In the present study, flow behavior in a swirl cup assembled in a confined chamber similar to a gas turbine combustor has been analyzed. Flow analysis has been carried out using ANSYS Fluent and turbulence has been modeled using Realizable k-ϵ model. Six swirl cup configurations have been analyzed; mass flow ratio between primary and secondary swirler and venturi converging area ratio have been varied. The effect of these parameters on downstream flow field has been studied by analyzing the profiles of axial, tangential and radial velocities downstream of swirl cup. The size and shape of the recirculation zone has been analyzed and reported for all configurations. Also, the mass flow recirculated by swirl cup has been estimated and compared amongst the configurations analyzed. Data thus generated is very useful in designing such swirl cups of gas turbine combustors.
