Experimental study of Gas-To-Liquid (GTL) and diesel fuel blends evaporation behaviour and droplet lifetime through Leidenfrost effect

Gas to Liquid (GTL) fuel is considered a clean alternative fuel and has been given much attention to replacing conventional fuel. Evaporation behaviour and droplet lifetime are critical aspects that need to be determined as these aspects can affect the fuel spray properties and improve the combustion process. In this study, a set of GTL-diesel fuel blends are prepared, which are G20, G50, G80, and G100 (the number represents the GTL percentage fuel ratio in the fuel blends). Subsequently, using a single droplet drop test on the hot plate (Leidenfrost effect), the GTL fuel blends droplet lifetime and evaporation behaviour are visualised using a high-speed camera connected to long-distance microscopy. An image processing system and a MatLab were used to measure and analyse the droplet evaporation data. Comparing the fuel characterisation of the GTL fuel and conventional diesel fuel, the GTL fuel shows a lower value in all properties tested except for the calorific value, cetane number, and vapour pressure. The qualitative results through the Leidenfrost effect have shown that increasing the GTL fuel ratio (20% to 100%) decreases the heating phase duration (37.3 % to 14.4 %) and evaporation rate (1.29 mm2/s to 1.10 mm2/s) while increasing their steady evaporation phase duration and droplet lifetime. The shorter period to achieve steady evaporation is beneficial as the spray inside the chamber has a limited time to evaporate for combustion.& COPY; 2023 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

Automated summary

This study investigates the evaporation behavior and droplet lifetime of GTL fuel blends using a single droplet drop test. The results show that increasing the GTL fuel ratio decreases the heating phase duration and evaporation rate while increasing the steady evaporation phase duration and droplet lifetime, which is beneficial for combustion.