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This paper provides a brief review of NASA's Rotary Engine Technology Enablement Program from 1983 through 1991, with primary emphasis on the CFD or Computational Fluid Dynamics approaches used since 1987. The main discussion includes both code development and applications to several particularly difficult internal airflow, fuel-air mixing and combustion-related problems. A summary of the final status of the technology is given.

A new computer code, AGNI-3D, has been developed for the modeling of combustion, spray, and flow properties in a stratified-charge rotary engine (SCRE). The mathematical and numerical details of the new code are described by the first author in a separate NASA publication. The solution procedure is based on an Eulerian-Lagrangian approach where the unsteady, three-dimensional Navier-Stokes equations for a perfect gas-mixture with variable properties are solved in generalized, Eulerian coordinates on a moving grid by making use of an implicit finite-volume, Steger-Warming flux vector splitting scheme. The liquid-phase equations are solved in Lagrangian coordinates. The engine configuration studied was similar to existing rotary engine flow-visualization and hot-firing test rigs. The results of limited test cases indicate a good degree of qualitative agreement between the predicted and measured pressures.