Effects of the structured lips on spray characteristics in prefilming airblast atomization

Nowadays, prefilming atomizers have been widely applied in aero-engine, industrial fields, and agricultural irrigation. In this study, atomization characteristics of the prefilming atomizers with structured lips have been investigated. The influence of eight structured lips on the spray breakup process has been measured using high-speed planner laser introduced fluorescence and particle/droplet image analysis in the planner prefilming air-blast atomizer. Synchronously, multi-directional visualization was used to measure hydrodynamic behavior. Rec-3 with a depth of 1 mm, a width of 1 mm, and a pitch of 0.5 mm has the smallest droplet size although it has medium breakup length and ligament velocity. For all studied structured prefilmers, rectangle and triangle structured lips performed good atomization effect than no structured lips except tri-1.