Experimental study of mixing enhancement using pylon in supersonic flow

• Evaluation of penetration and spreading of the secondary jet into the main flow.
• Maximum spreading and penetration of secondary jet could be achieved only if the same is relatively high at injection location.
• Penetration of the secondary jet is directly proportional to pylon height.

The Supersonic Combustion Ramjet (SCRAMJET) engine has been recognized as one of the most promising air breathing propulsion system for the supersonic/hypersonic flight mission requirements. Mixing and combustion of fuel inside scramjet engine is one of the major challenging tasks. In the current study the main focus has been to increase the penetration and mixing of the secondary jet inside the test chamber at supersonic speeds. In view of this, experiments are conducted to evaluate the effect of pylon on the mixing of secondary jet injection into supersonic mainstream flow at Mach 1.65. Two different pylons are investigated and the results are compared with those obtained by normal injection from a flat plate. The mixing studies are performed by varying the height of the pylon while keeping all other parameters the same. The study mainly focused on analyzing the area of spread and penetration depth achieved by different injection schemes based on the respective parameters. The measurements involved Mie scattering visualization and the flow features are analyzed using Schlieren images. The penetration height and spread area are the two parameters that are used for analyzing and comparing the performance of the pylons. It is observed that the secondary jet injection carried out from behind the big pylon resulted in maximum penetration and spread area of the jet as compared to the small pylon geometry. Moreover it is also evident that for obtaining maximum spreading and penetration of the jet, the same needs to be achieved at the injection location.