Experimental research on the instability propagation characteristics of liquid kerosene rotating detonation wave

In order to study the instability propagation characteristics of the liquid kerosene rotating detonation wave (RDW), a series of experimental tests were carried out on the rotating detonation combustor (RDC) with air-heater. The fuel and oxidizer are room-temperature liquid kerosene and preheated oxygen-enriched air, respectively. The experimental tests keep the equivalence ratio of 0.81 and the oxygen mass fraction of 35% unchanged, and the total mass flow rate is maintained at about 1000 g/s, changing the total temperature of the oxygen-enriched air from 620 K to 860 K. Three different types of instability were observed in the experiments: temporal and spatial instability, mode transition and re-initiation. The interaction between RDW and supply plenum may be the main reason for the fluctuations of detonation wave velocity and pressure peaks with time. Moreover, the inconsistent mixing of fuel and oxidizer at different circumferential positions is related to RDW oscillate spatially. The phenomenon of single-double-single wave transition is analyzed. During the transition, the initial RDW weakens until disappears, and the compression wave strengthens until it becomes a new RDW and propagates steadily. The increased deflagration between the detonation products and the fresh gas layer caused by excessively high temperature is one of the reasons for the RDC quenching and re-initiation.