Cavitation characteristic in aviation fuel pump based on surrogate fuel

To study the cavitation characteristic in an aviation fuel pump with China Daqing RP-3 kerosene as flowing medium, the cavitating flows in the aviation fuel pump under high temperature and low pressure circumstance were researched based on the numerical simulations. Surrogate fuel was put forward to take the place of the kerosene in the complex components. A four-species surrogate fuel consisting in mole fraction of 74.5% dodecane, 10% methylcyclohexane, 10% toluene and 5.5% octane was selected to simulate the real Daqing RP-3 kerosene. Local swirling correction turbulence model derived from the standard k-ε two-equation model and Zwart-Gerber-Belamri cavitation model were applied into the numerical simulations. The numerical data were compared with the experimental results. The results show that this numerical method based on surrogate fuel and local swirling correction turbulence model can calculate the cavitation characteristic in the aviation fuel pump accurately. Thermodynamic effects of Daqing RP-3 kerosene can be ignored, but the temperature has an influence on cavitation characteristic of the aviation fuel pump. The cavitation characteristic of the aviation fuel pump is worse under 80℃. Rotational speed has a great influence on cavitation characteristic of the aviation fuel pump. The cavitation specific speed is the highest under 10000 r/min, and the cavitation characteristic is the best.