Effects of detonation initial conditions on performance of pulse detonation chamber-axial turbine combined system

The pulse detonation turbine engine (PDTE) has a potential performance advantage over conventional gas turbine engines due to the self-pressurization feature of detonation. However, pulse detonation exhibits strong unsteadiness, and large flow losses can be generated when the detonation wave interacts with the turbine blades, which severely limits engine performance. Therefore, how to maximize this potential performance advantage is crucial to the application of the PDTE. If the detonation initial conditions could be adjusted to modify the characteristics of detonation so that the pulse detonation chamber (PDC) and turbine are well matched, the performance of the PDTE could be greatly improved. Taking this into account, this paper numerically investigated the performance of the PDC-turbine combined system with different hydrogen-air mixture equivalence ratios and initial temperatures. The turbine efficiency and PDC combustion efficiency were analyzed first, which provided guidance for the thermal efficiency analysis. The results indicated that the combined system was more suitable for operation under lean fuel conditions due to the high thermal efficiency and obvious performance advantage over isobaric combustion. In addition, increasing the initial temperature could improve thermal efficiency under lean fuel conditions, but some of the performance advantage would be sacrificed.