Development and verification of a physical–chemical surrogate model of RP-3 kerosene with skeletal mechanism for aircraft SI engine

Abstract A three-component surrogate model was developed to emulate both the physical and chemical characteristics of RP-3 kerosene for aircraft spark ignition (SI) engine. Due to the similar carbon number and physical–chemical properties, n-decane (C10H22), 1,3,5-trimethylbenzene (C9H12) and iso-dodecane (IC12H26) were selected as surrogate fuel (46.31%/25%/28.69% by mole, respectively). The surrogate well captured the target properties of RP-3, including RON, CN, H/C ratio, MW, LHV, liquid density, kinematic viscosity and surface tension. Furthermore, a skeletal mechanism of RP-3 was developed based on the provided surrogate model. The RP-3 sub-mechanism only included 65 species and 200 reactions which was efficient and compact for complex CFD simulation. The mechanism of each pure component and RP-3 surrogate had been verified with the ignition delay time data under various conditions. The measured species concentrations and laminar flame speed data were also used to test the kinetic mechanism. Surrogate model and skeletal sub-mechanism were implemented under evaporating spray environment, Bunsen burner and SI engine mode by CFD method. The acceptable agreement between experiments and simulations proved the reliability of the skeletal mechanism of RP-3 surrogate in SI engine simulation.