Modelling spherical flame propagation in a closed volume

The highly exothermic reaction of fuel combustion is the most common source of usable energy in the world. The fuel itself originates almost entirely from fossil fuels, such as crude oil and natural gas. The use of these fuels for energy production is under pressure in recent times due to environmental and availability concerns. This then sets the stage for combustion research aimed at providing more efficient combustion processes and characterising the combustion behaviour of alternative fuels. The laminar flame speed of a combustible mixture is a well defined combustion characteristic that influences the efficiency and performance of many combustion processes. An example of where flame speed has a strong impact on the performance of a combustion process, is the blow-out and relight ability in flight applications of gas turbine engines. A very common experimental setup to obtain laminar flame speed data is the constant volume combustion bomb, where the laminar flame speed is calculated from the measured flame speed of a spherical flame, propagating outwards inside a usually spherical combustion chamber.

Grantor dc:publisher.institution

Department of Chemical Engineering

Year dc:date.issued

2014

Author dc:creator

• Scott, Ian Stefanes

Advisors dc:contributor.advisor

• Möller, Klaus
• Woolard, Chris

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/11427/9126

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/9126