This paper presents a semi-analytical analysis for modeling effects of
moderate turbulence flows on the vaporization of an isolated fuel droplet
at ambient room temperature and atmospheric pressure conditions. The
turbulent Nusselt and Sherwood numbers used in this model are purely
empirical. Two different hydrocarbon fuels were tested, i.e. n-heptane,
and n-decane each has an initial diameter of 1.5 mm. The droplet
Reynolds number, Red, is changed in the range (60–500), and turbulence
intensity varied between 0 % and 11 %. The major findings of this study
showed that the droplet's vaporization rate, which is deduced from the
steady-state linear variation of the droplet squared diameter, increases
with increasing turbulence intensity. Also, the results from using several
liquid fuels, i.e. n-hexane, n-heptane, n-octane and n-decane, show that
the vaporization Damköhler number, Dav, is correlated to nondimensional
turbulence evaporation rate, K/KL, by an exponential
relation. Also, the applicability of this correlation at high Reynolds
numbers has been studied.