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Measurements and Simulations of Low Strain Rate Non-Premixed Methane Flame Extinction

Published

Author(s)

Anthony Hamins, Matthew Bundy, C B. Oh

Abstract

The extinction and structure of non-premixed flames were investigated through the comparison of experiments and calculations using a counterflow configuration. Experiments were conducted at the NASA Glenn Research Center s 2.2 s drop tower to attain extinction and temperature measurements in low-strain non-premixed methane-air flames. Extinction measurements using nitrogen added to the fuel stream were performed for global strain rates from 7 s-1 to 50 s-1. The results confirmed the turning point behavior previously observed in microgravity by Maruta et al. in the 10 s JAIMAC drop tower. The maximum nitrogen volume fraction in the fuel stream needed to assure extinction for all strain rates was measured to be 0.855 0.016, associated with the turning point determined to occur at a strain rate of 15 s-1. Flame temperature measurements were attained in the high temperature region of the flame (T > 1200 K) using visible emission from a SiC filament positioned axially along the burner centerline. This method was used to obtain the time varying temperatures as the flame transitioned from normal gravity to microgravity conditions and as the flame extinguished. Microgravity temperature measurements showed that the peak flame temperature of 1375 ( 75) K was measured for a global strain rate of 20 s-1 for conditions when the flame was very near extinction (99 % of the N2 volume fraction in the fuel stream required for extinction in microgravity).A two dimensional flame simulation was developed. Computations were favorably compared to extinction and temperature measurements in both normal and microgravity.
Citation
Thirtyth International Symposium on Combustion

Keywords

extinction, flame, methane, microgravity, strain, suppression, temperature

Citation

Hamins, A. , Bundy, M. and Oh, C. (2017), Measurements and Simulations of Low Strain Rate Non-Premixed Methane Flame Extinction, Thirtyth International Symposium on Combustion (Accessed March 29, 2024)
Created February 19, 2017