Effect of macroscopic heterogeneity of the medium on the solid-state combustion wave characteristics in thermally and chemically heterogeneous media

A macroscopically heterogeneous medium is modeled by a set of cylinders (rods) pressed from a mixture of solid reagents, which have coaxial cylindrical cores made from an inert material. A three-dimensional mathematical model describing propagation of combustion waves over one cylinder is studied by numerical methods. The influence of the distance between the centerlines of the neighboring cylinders and transverse sizes of the cylinders on characteristics of combustion waves propagating over a heterogeneous medium is considered. It is demonstrated that there exists an optimal distance between the inert rods, which ensures a much higher velocity of the combustion wave along the specimen than the theoretically predicted velocity of the classical combustion wave propagating over a solid specimen. New types of spinning waves are described, whose motion makes the high-temperature spot move inside the charge mixture. __________ Translated from Fizika Goreniya i Vzryva, Vol. 44, No. 3, pp. 39–49, May–June, 2008.