Investigation of strut-ramp injector in a Scramjet combustor: Effect of strut geometry, fuel and jet diameter on mixing characteristics

The strut-based injector has been found to be one of the most promising injector designs for a supersonic combustor, offering enhanced mixing of fuel and air. The mixing and flow field characteristics of the straight (SS) and Tapered strut (TS), with fixed ramp angle and height at free stream Mach number 2 in conjunction with fuel injection at Mach 2.3 have been investigated numerically and reported. In the present investigation, hydrogen (H₂) and ethylene (C₂H₄) are injected in oncoming supersonic flow from the back of the strut, where jet to free stream momentum ratio is maintained at 0.79 and 0.69 for H2 and C₂H₄, respectively. The predicted wall static pressure and species mole fractions at various downstream locations are compared with the experimental data for TS case with 0.6 mm jet diameter and found to be in good agreement. Further, the effect of jet diameter and strut geometry on the near field mixing in strut ramp configuration is discussed for both the fuels. The numerical results are assessed based on various parameters for the performance evaluation of different strut ramp configurations. The SS configuration for both the injectant has been found to be an optimum candidate; also it is observed that for higher jet diameter larger combustor length is required to achieve satisfactory near field mixing