Nonlinear analysis of pressure oscillations in ramjet engines

Abstract

Pressure oscillations in ramjet engines have been studied using an approximate method which treats the flow fields in the inlet and the combustor separately. The acoustic fields in the combustor are expressed as syntheses of coupled nonlinear oscillators corresponding to the acoustic modes of the chamber. The influences of the inlet flow appear in the admittance function at the inlet /combustor interface, providing the necessary boundary condition for calculation of the combustor flow. A general framework dealing with nonlinear multi-degree-of-freedom system has also been constructed to study the time evolution of each mode. Both linear and nonlinear stabilities are treated. The results obtained serve as a basis for investigating the existence and stabilities of limit cycles for acoustic modes. As a specific example, the analysis is applied to a problem of nonlinear transverse oscillations in ramjet engines.