A Multiple-Burner Approach to Passive Control of Multiple Longitudinal Acoustic Instabilities in Combustors

Abstract Presently, passive methods of controlling combustion instability fall short when one considers stabilizing multiple acoustic modes. In this paper, we present a passive control approach based on the locations of the burners to stabilize multiple acoustic modes. The approach is demonstrated using linear stability analysis performed on a canonical open–open rectangular tube enclosing a flame. A linear flame model based on the kinematic description of the flame surface is used. A simultaneous solution method, as opposed to a segregated method, is developed to calculate the mean flow and to evaluate mode shapes and eigenvalues. The stability analysis is performed both on single and on multiple-burner combustors. In the latter case, the axial and transversal arrangement of burners considered preserves the net volumetric heat release rate and exit temperature. The problem of stabilizing the first three acoustic modes is cast as a multi-objective optimization problem for both types of combustors using the location(s) of the burner(s) as decision variable(s). We show that the use of multiple burners markedly increases the stability of the first three modes while not disturbing the combustor design parameters.