Numerical Models for Simulation of Water Ingestion in Aeronautical Combustors

1. Abstract Ingestion of water, in the forms of vapour, condensed droplets, rain, snow, and hail from the atmosphere into the inlet of gas turbine engines can significantly affect their performance, operability and safety during take-off, flight and landing. Therefore, precise understanding of engine responses to ingested water must be established during design and development phases and then verified as part of the engine certification process. Test capabilities are currently available in either ground level test facilities and altitude test facilities to duplicate most of the water ingestion conditions encountered during aircraft operations. The use of recently advanced computer models allows the final combustor configuration to be analysed, thus reducing experimental activities, with positive impact on development costs. In this paper Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) numerical models to simulate water ingestion are presented. Comparison with available experimental data, carried out on a an annular straight flow combustor produced at AVIO, has also been performed.