Self-induced instabilities of premixed flames in a multiple injection configuration

This article presents an experimental study of self-sustained instabilities of an ensemble of premixed flames anchored on perforated plates. A theoretical analysis based on experimental results is developed in order to model the acoustic-flame coupling. In the unconfined configuration envisaged in this study, the coupling occurs with the upstream cavity. Experiments carried out on this multipoint injection configuration concern the acoustic response of the system and the influence of the perforated plate impedance, the emission of sound by the flames and the combustion transfer function. The thickness of the perforated plate is an important parameter that modifies the resonant frequencies and the ranges of instability. Instability bands determined by the model are in good agreement with experimental data, providing a suitable explanation of the mode hopping process characterizing such configurations.     

Blowoff dynamics of bluff body stabilized turbulent premixed flames

This article concerns the flame dynamics of a bluff body stabilized turbulent premixed flame as it approaches lean blowoff. Time resolved chemiluminescence imaging along with simultaneous particle image velocimetry and OH planar laser-induced fluorescence were utilized in an axisymmetric bluff body stabilized, propane-air flame to determine the sequence of events leading to blowoff and provide a quantitative analysis of the experimental results. It was found that as lean blowoff is approached by reduction of equivalence ratio, flame speed decreases and the flame shape progressively changes from a conical to a columnar shape. For a stably burning conical flame away from blowoff, the flame front envelopes the shear layer vortices. Near blowoff, the columnar flame front and shear layer vortices overlap to induce high local stretch rates that exceed the extinction stretch rates instantaneously and in the mean, resulting in local flame extinction along the shear layers. Following shear layer extinction, fresh reactants can pass through the shear layers to react within the recirculation zone with all other parts of the flame extinguished. This flame kernel within the recirculation zone may survive for a few milliseconds and can reignite the shear layers such that the entire flame is reestablished for a short period. This extinction and reignition event can happen several times before final blowoff which occurs when the flame kernel fails to reignite the shear layers and ultimately leads to total flame extinguishment.     

Experimental study on premixed combustion of spherically propagating methanol-air-nitrogen flames

The outward propagation and development of surface instability of the spark-ignited spherical premixed flames for methanol-air-nitrogen mixtures were experimentally studied by using a constant volume combustion chamber and a high-speed schlieren photography system. The laminar burning velocities, the mass burning fluxes, and the Markstein lengths were obtained at different equivalence ratios, dilution ratios, initial temperatures, and pressures. The laminar burning velocities and the mass burning fluxes give a similar curve versus the equivalence ratios. They increase with the increase of initial temperature and decrease with the increase of dilution ratio. The laminar burning velocity decreases with elevating the initial pressure, while the mass burning flux increases with the increase of the initial pressure. Markstein length decreases slightly with the increase of initial temperature for the rich mixtures. High initial pressure corresponds to low Markstein length. Markstein length increases with the increase of dilution ratio, which is more obvious when the mixture becomes leaner. Equivalence ratio has a slight impact on the development of the diffusive-thermal cellular structure at elevated initial pressures. The initial pressure has a significant influence on the occurrence of the flame front cellular structure. At the elevated pressures, the cracks on the flame surface branch and develop into the cell structure. These cells are bounded by cracks emitting a bright light, which may indicate soot formation. For very lean mixture combustion, the buoyancy effect and cooling effect from the spark electrodes have a significant impact on the flame propagation. The hydrodynamic instability, inhibited with the increase of initial temperature around the stoichiometric equivalence ratio, is enhanced with the increase of initial pressure and suppressed by mixture dilution.     

Experimental study on premixed combustion of spherically propagating methanol-air-nitrogen flames

The outward propagation and development of surface instability of the spark-ignited spherical premixed flames for methanol-air-nitrogen mixtures were experimentally studied by using a constant volume combustion chamber and a high-speed schlieren photography system. The laminar burning velocities, the mass burning fluxes, and the Markstein lengths were obtained at different equivalence ratios, dilution ratios, initial temperatures, and pressures. The laminar burning velocities and the mass burning fluxes give a similar curve versus the equivalence ratios. They increase with the increase of initial temperature and decrease with the increase of dilution ratio. The laminar burning velocity decreases with elevating the initial pressure, while the mass burning flux increases with the increase of the initial pressure. Markstein length decreases slightly with the increase of initial temperature for the rich mixtures. High initial pressure corresponds to low Markstein length. Markstein length increases with the increase of dilution ratio, which is more obvious when the mixture becomes leaner. Equivalence ratio has a slight impact on the development of the diffusive-thermal cellular structure at elevated initial pressures. The initial pressure has a significant influence on the occurrence of the flame front cellular structure. At the elevated pressures, the cracks on the flame surface branch and develop into the cell structure. These cells are bounded by cracks emitting a bright light, which may indicate soot formation. For very lean mixture combustion, the buoyancy effect and cooling effect from the spark electrodes have a significant impact on the flame propagation. The hydrodynamic instability, inhibited with the increase of initial temperature around the stoichiometric equivalence ratio, is enhanced with the increase of initial pressure and suppressed by mixture dilution.     

Onset of cellular instabilities in spherically propagating hydrogen-air premixed laminar flames

Using high-speed Schlieren and Shadow photography, the instabilities of outwardly propagating spherical hydrogen-air flames have been studied in a constant volume combustion bomb. Combustion under different equivalence ratios (0.2 ∼ 1.0), temperatures (298 K ∼ 423 K) and pressures (1.0 bar ∼ 10.0 bar) is visualized. The results show that flames experience both unequal diffusion and/or hydrodynamic instabilities at different stages of propagation. The critical flame radius for such instabilities is measured and correlated to the variations of equivalence ratio, temperature and pressure. Analysis revealed that equivalence ratio affects unequal diffusion instability via varying the Lewis number, Le$Le$; increased temperature can delay both types of instabilities in the majority of tests by promoting combustion rate and changing density ratio; pressure variation has minor effect on unequal diffusion instability but is responsible for enhancing hydrodynamic instability, particularly for stoichiometric and near-stoichiometric flames.     

Blowoff mechanism of harmonically forced bluff body stabilized turbulent premixed flames

Flame blowoff under harmonic forcing of upstream mixture velocity is analyzed for bluff-body stabilized conical premixed flames in a laboratory burner. It is found that the forced vortex shedding phenomenon within the recirculation zone, accompanies flame blowoff when the convective wavelength of the imposed oscillation is larger than the recirculation zone length in the streamwise direction. The experimental results obtained from combined particle image velocimetry and planar laser induced fluorescence of OH radical provide evidence for this behavior. The differences between forced and unforced flame blowoff are also discussed.     

Measurements of propagation speeds and flame instabilities in biomass derived gas-air premixed flames

Three biomass derived gases (BDGs, named GG-H, GG-L and GG-V), which are derived from industry facilities and can be useful for reducing CO₂ and the application to combustors, are studied and examined for some basic flame characteristics such as unstretched laminar burning velocity, Markstein length, and cell formation over the entire flame surface. Experiments were conducted in a constant volume combustion chamber using a schlieren system. A better agreement between the measured and predicted unstretched laminar burning velocities is obtained using a suggested reaction mechanism modified from the GRI-Mech 3.0 mechanism. Additionally, cell formations on flame surfaces of the three mixtures were also analyzed and compared using high-speed schlieren images. It is shown that the GG-H-air flames and the GG-L-air flames have similar flame wrinkled surfaces, while the GG-V-air flames shows a stronger cellularity behavior. The effects of each fuel component in mixtures to cellularity are also evaluated by varying the concentration of each fuel in the reactant mixtures. The cellular instability is promoted (diminished) with hydrogen enrichment (methane addition); meanwhile the similar behavior is obtained for carbon monoxide addition.     

Study of laminar combustion characteristics of gasoline surrogate fuel-hydrogen-air premixed flames

This paper investigated the effects of hydrogen addition to gasoline surrogates fuel-air mixture on the premixed spherical flame laminar combustion characteristics. The experiments were carried out by high speed Schlieren photography on a constant-volume combustion vessel. Combining with nonlinear fitting technique, the variation of flame propagation speed, laminar burning velocity, Markstein length, flame thickness, thermal expansion coefficient and mass burning flux were studied at various equivalence ratios (0.8–1.4) and hydrogen mixing ratios (0%–50%). The results suggested that the nonlinear fitting method had a better agreement with the experimental data in this paper and the flame propagation was strongly effected by stretch at low equivalence ratios. The stretched propagation speed increased with the increase of hydrogen fraction at the same equivalence ratio. For a given hydrogen fraction, Markstein length decreased with the increase of equivalence ratio; flame propagation speed and laminar burning velocity first increased and then decreased with the increase of equivalence ratio while the peaks of the burning velocity shifted toward the richer side with the increase of hydrogen fraction.     

Oscillatory velocity response of premixed flat flames stabilized in axial acoustic fields

This article describes a combined theoretical-experimental investigation of the processes that drive axial instabilities in solid propellant rocket motors. In this study, the solid propellant flame has been simulated by a premixed flat flame that has been stabilized on the porous side-wall of a duct. The driving processes have been investigated by studying the interaction of the premixed flame with an axial acoustic field. Using experimentally determined acoustic pressures, burner surface admittances, and steady-state flame temperature distributions as input data, the developed model was used to determine the characteristics of the velocity field in the flame region under a variety of test conditions. The predicted velocity field was then compared with LDV velocity measurements to check the validity of the model and determine the flame driving. These studies reveal that the investigated flame responds to the presence of an axial acoustic field by producing an oscillatory velocity component, ν′, normal to the duct wall, that can drive or damp the acoustic field. Comparison of the measured data with the model predictions reveal satisfactory agreement. These studies also showed that driving and damping of the acoustic field occur simultaneously in different regions of the flame. The net effect of the flame upon the acoustic field depends upon the relative magnitudes of these opposing tendencies. It is also shown that the flame driving depends upon the acoustic admittance of the side-wall surface and the frequency of the acoustic field.     

The influence of reactant temperature on the dynamics of bluff body stabilized premixed flames

The impact of increased reactant temperature on the dynamics of bluff-body stabilized premixed flows is investigated using numerical simulation. A two-dimensional triangular bluff body is considered. Flow compressibility is assumed to exist at the low Mach number limit and combustion is fast and robust such that a flamesheet representation is assumed to apply. In this formulation, reactant temperature variations are represented via corresponding temperature ratio and flame speed variations. The Lagrangian, Transport Element Method is used to provide the numerical solutions. Results indicate that as reactant temperature increases, the fluid dynamics transition from a low amplitude, broadband, coarsely symmetric (about the bluff-body centerline) behavior, to a high amplitude, tonal and asymmetric one that bears similarities to the corresponding non-reacting flow. The reasons for this are that as the reactant temperature increases, (i) the temperature ratio across the flame is reduced, thus reducing combustion exothermicity, and (ii) the flame speed increases causing the flame to propagate away from the bluff-body wake. In both cases the ability of the two main combustion-driven fluid dynamical processes, namely volumetric expansion and baroclinic generation to impact the bluff body generated vorticity is reduced. Reduction in baroclinic generation enables to wake to survive futher downsteam and makes the flow susceptible to the wake instability. As reactant temperature is increased the location of the onset of the instability moves upstream. At very high reactant temperatures even the near field symmetrizing effect of volumetric expansion is overwhelmed and asymmetric vortex shedding is witnessed at the bluff body. Even in this regime, the flow differs from the non-reacting flow in that it is susceptible to bifurcations in vortex shedding behavior that are linked to local flame-vortex interactions. Results also show that in the general case, knowledge of the fluid dynamics alone is not sufficient to characterize the flame dynamics, as the flame position in relation to the vorticity field is critical to the unsteady flame response. Specifically, the flame exhibits a similar transition from a broadband to a tonal response but the amplitude is not monotonically increasing. Rather it experiences a regime of decreasing response for intermediate reactant temperatures where the flame propagation away from the wake appears to dominate the increase in fluid dynamical induced oscillations due to the enhancement of the asymmetric mode.     

Effects of hydrocarbon addition on cellular instabilities in expanding syngas–air spherical premixed flames

Experiments were conducted in a constant pressure combustion chamber using high-speed schlieren imaging to investigate the effects of hydrocarbon addition on cellular instabilities of syngas–air flames at room temperature and elevated pressures. The measured laminar burning velocities were compared with the predicted results computed using some reliable kinetic mechanisms with detailed transport and chemistry. The cellular instabilities for the hydrocarbon-added syngas–air flames were interpreted and evaluated in the viewpoint of the hydrodynamic and diffusional–thermal instabilities. Also, experimentally measured Peclet numbers were compared with the predicted results for fuel-lean flames. Experimental results showed that the laminar burning velocities decreased significantly with the increase amount of hydrocarbon addition in the reactant mixtures. With propane and butane additions, the propensity for cells formation was significantly diminished in both hydrodynamic and diffusional–thermal instabilities, whereas the cellular instabilities for methane-added syngas–air flames are not suppressed.     

Effects of hydrogen peroxide on combustion enhancement of premixed methane/air flames

Hydrogen peroxide is generally considered to be an effective combustion promoter for different fuels. The effects of hydrogen peroxide on the combustion enhancement of premixed methane/air flames are investigated numerically using the PREMIX code of Chemkin collection 3.5 with the GRI-Mech 3.0 chemical kinetic mechanisms and detailed transport properties. To study into the enhancement behavior, hydrogen peroxide is used for two different conditions: (1) as the oxidizer substituent by partial replacement of air and (2) as the oxidizer supplier by using different concentrations of H₂O₂. Results show that the laminar burning velocity and adiabatic flame temperature of methane flame are significantly enhanced with H₂O₂ addition. Besides, the addition of H₂O₂ increases the CH₄ consumption rate and CO production rate, but reduces CO₂ productions. Nevertheless, using a lower volumetric concentration of H₂O₂ as an oxidizer is prone to reduce CO formation. The OH concentration is increased with increasing H₂O₂ addition due to apparent shifting of major reaction pathways. The increase of OH concentration significantly enhances the reaction rate leading to enhanced laminar burning velocity and combustion. As to NO emission, using H₂O₂ as an oxidizer will never produce NO, but NO emission will increase due to enhanced flame temperature when air is partially replaced by H₂O_2.     

Effects of diluents on cellular instabilities in outwardly propagating spherical syngas–air premixed flames

Experiments were conducted in a constant pressure combustion chamber using schlieren system to investigate the effects of carbon dioxide–nitrogen–helium diluents on cellular instabilities of syngas–air premixed flames at room temperature and elevated pressures. The cellular instabilities for the diluted syngas–air flames were interpreted and evaluated in the viewpoint of the hydrodynamic and diffusional-thermal instabilities. Laminar burning velocities and Markstein lengths were calculated by analyzing high-speed schlieren images at various diluent concentrations and equivalence ratios. The measured unstretched laminar burning velocities were compared with the predicted results computed using the PREMIX code with the kinetic mechanism developed by Sun et al. Also, experimentally measured Peclet numbers were compared with the predicted results for fuel–lean flames. Experimental results showed substantial reduction of the laminar burning velocities and of the Markstein lengths with the diluent additions in the fuel blends. Effective Lewis numbers of helium-diluted syngas–air flames increased but those of carbon dioxide- and nitrogen-diluted syngas–air flames decreased in increase of diluents in the reactant mixtures. With helium diluent, the propensity for cells formation was significantly diminished, whereas the cellular instabilities for carbon dioxide- and nitrogen-diluted syngas–air flames were not suppressed.     

A numerical study on combustion and emission characteristics of premixed hydrogen air flames

Main challenges for micro power generators that utilize combustion process for energy production are inadequate residence time, destructive radical wall interactions and intensified heat loss which are mainly rooted from size limitation of such devices. To achieve high and uniform energy output, and bring in a solution to these challenges in an environment friendly manner without any kind of fundamental modification, effect of equivalence ratio on combustion and emission behavior of premixed hydrogen/air flames is numerically investigated in this study. For this purpose, an experimentally tested micro cylindrical combustor model is constructed and premixed hydrogen/air combustion in this model is simulated by varying equivalence ratio between 0.5 and 1.2 to find an optimal equivalence ratio with respect to drawbacks of micro power generators. Combustion and turbulence models implemented in this study are Eddy Dissipation Concept and Standard k-ε models, respectively. A detailed hydrogen/air reaction mechanism which consists of 9 species and 19 steps is employed to accurately gain insight into combustion process. Simulation results show that as the equivalence ratio decreases; centerline temperature distribution gets a lower value and the place where chemical reactions take place moves downstream. The most uniform temperature distribution is achieved between 0.8 and 1.0 equivalence ratios. The highest NO_x formation is at 0.9 equivalence ratio and its mass fraction decreases sharply when the equivalence ratio reduces from 0.9 to 0.5.     

Self-excited oscillations in combustion chambers with premixed flames and several frequencies

Experimental results of self-excited oscillations in combustion chambers, using a simple laboratory burner with flames of small extension, are presented for situations when more than one frequency is excited and, owing to the unsteady sound field, phase shifts vary continually between sound pressure and sound particle velocity. Here, in sequence phase positions in which the sound particle velocity precedes the sound pressure interchange with those in which the velocity lags behind the pressure. In these cases the question arises as to how the flame adapts itself the pressure oscillations which change with time. It is the purpose of this work to reach conclusions regarding this by experiments with simultaneous recording of oscillations in the sound pressure, sound particle velocity, and combustion.The multiplicity of ways of maintaining self-excited oscillations when several frequencies are excited should be regarded in the light of the difficulty of avoiding such oscillations in technical systems.     

Response dynamics of bluff-body stabilized conical premixed turbulent flames with spatial mixture gradients

Response of bluff-body stabilized conical turbulent premixed flames was experimentally studied for a range of excitation frequencies (10-400 Hz), mean flow velocities (5, 10 and 15 m/s) and three different spatial mixture distributions (uniform, inner and outer enrichment). Upstream excitation was provided by a loudspeaker producing velocity oscillation amplitudes of about 8% of the mean flow velocity. Flame response was detected by a photomultiplier observing the CH^∗ emission from the flame. The studied turbulent flames exhibited transfer function characteristics of a low-pass filter with a cutoff Strouhal number between 0.08 and 0.12. The amplification factors at low frequencies ranged from 2 to 20 and generally increased for mean flow velocities from 5 to 15 m/s. The highest levels of amplification were found for the outer mixture enrichment followed in decreasing order by uniform and inner mixture gradient cases. The high levels of flame response for the outer enrichment case were attributed to the enhanced flame-vortex interaction in outer jet shear layer. At high excitation levels (u^′/Um≈0.3) for where non-linear flame response is expected, the flame exhibited a reduced amplitude response in the frequency range between 40 and 100 Hz for the uniform and outer equivalence ratio gradient cases and no discernible effect for the inner equivalence ratio gradient. In all cases, transfer function phase was found to vary linearly with excitation frequency. Finally, a relationship between the amplitude characteristics of the bluff-body wake transfer function and flame blowoff equivalence ratio was presented.     

Particle combustion rates in premixed flames of polydisperse metal—air aerosols

A new approach and experimental technique are proposed to determine times of metal particle combustion in flames of polydisperse aerosols. Laminar flames are produced in air at 1 atm, using aerosol jets formed by an electrostatic particulate method. The flame radiation intensities as a function of vertical coordinate are measured and compared with the flame radiation profiles reconstructed using experimental data and simplified models. The experimental data used include particle size distributions, flame velocities, and temperatures of metal ignition and combustion. The simplified models describe the particle ignition delay, combustion time, and particle flame radiation intensity as a function of particle diameter, D. Variable parameters of the models describing particle radiation intensities and combustion times are adjusted to achieve the best fit between the reconstructed and measured flame radiation profiles. A set of parameters providing the best agreement between the reconstructed and measured profiles is selected for several aerosol flames produced by powders of different sizes of the same material. These parameters are assumed to adequately describe particle combustion times and radiation intensities for the chosen material. The experimental radiation profiles for both aluminum and magnesium aerosol flames with particles of different sizes were found to be in very good agreement with the respective reconstructed profiles. For both metals, particle radiation intensities were well described by a D³-type expression. The combustion times for magnesium aerosol particles were well described by the traditional D²-law with the evaporation constant close to those reported earlier for single particles. Aluminum aerosol particle combustion was better described by a D¹-law and combustion times of fine (<80 μm) aluminum particles in the aerosol were somewhat longer than the reported earlier combustion times for single aluminum particles.     

Microwave effects on premixed flames

It has been proposed in the literature that microwave heating of combustion-generated plasmas in intenal-combustion engines can be used to increase the rate of combustion of dilute mixtures. Experiments were conducted on fuel-lean laminar flames held above a porous burner flowing premixed mixtures of fuel (propane, ethylene, or methane) and oxidizer (air or oxygen-argon mixtures). A flame was positioned in a cavity resonated with microwaves at a frequency of about 2.4 GHz, with electric field intensities ranging to over 10⁵ V/m. For the lean-mixture air flames (0.6 < equivalence ratio < 0.8) examined in this study, burning velocity enhancement increased with electric field intensity to a maximum value of 6%. We conclude that the enhancement can be explained in terms of simple microwave heating of the bulk gases in the flame zone, which yields a greater flame temperature.