Fluid management solutions in aerospace propulsion can be notoriously difficult, primarily due to the extreme nature of fuel properties and their requisite operating conditions. In general, hydrocarbon fuels necessary for propulsion possess low surface energies and can easily wet most surfaces, even wicking around seals and other fluid barriers which can require costly rebuilds of engine components. Imparting passive fluid management onto surfaces via engineered anisotropic wettability is highly desirable to control location-specific fluid wicking and/or prevent fluid wetting. It can be shown that by designing regions of wettable and non-wettable areas, capillary pressure gradients can be formed allowing rapid pumpless transport of fuels across these surfaces. Taken a step further, the regions can be designed as metering devices allowing for discrete fluid volume transport and mixing.<br/>

Pumpless transport for passive aerospace fuel management solutions

255th National Meeting (2018)

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