Advanced combustion

Aerospace Engineering Department

Spring 2020

Instructor: Amir Mardani

[Amardani@sharif.edu]

1 A. Mardani, Chapter 6, 2020.

  Laminar Premixed Flames
 Physical Description
 Simplified Analysis
 Factors Influencing Flame Velocity and
Thickness

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3 A. Mardani, Chapter 6, 2020.
 Classification of Flames

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 Premixed versus Diffusion flame

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 1. Laminar premixed flames

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 Deflagration and Detonation

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 Deflagration and Detonation

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9 A. Mardani, Chapter 6, 2020.
 • Laminar flame theory: What do we particularly feel interested in?

Laminar burning velocity, SL: It is the velocity with which the flame front
propagates normal to itself into the unburned mixture

Steady combustion wave propagation

Various flame theories attempt to predict the laminar flame propagation from physical and
chemical properties:
• Thermal theory (Mallard and Le Chatelier; Zeldovich, Frank-Kamenetsky and
Semenov): the mixture is heated by conduction to the point where the reaction is
sufficiently rapid to become self-propagating
• Diffusion theory (Tanford and Pease): diffusion of active species, such as atoms and
radicals, from the reaction zone into the unreacted mixture causes reaction to occur

REALITY: Diffusion Of Heat And Active Radicals

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 The flame consists of two zones:
• Pre-heat zone: the unburned gases are
heated by conduction and reach ignition
• Reaction zone: chemical enthalpy is
converted into sensible enthalpy

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 1. Laminar premixed flames
A premixed flame is a self-sustaining propagation of a localized combustion zone
at subsonic velocities (deflagration regime)
The classical device to generate a laminar premixed flame is the Bunsen burner:

Typical Bunsen burner flame

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 Example: Typical Bunsen-burner CH4/Air flame

Outer diffusion flame

Outer cone (luminous zone):

reaction and heat transfer

Preheating region
containing fuel and air

Inner cone (dark zone):

fuel rich flame

Typical Bunsen-burner flame is a dual flame:

• a fuel-rich premixed inner flame
• a diffusion outer flame: CO and H2 from inner flame encounter ambient air
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 • Experimental evidence for the presence of a cool inner preheating region

A wire to reveal the presence of a cool preheating region containing unburned CH4 and O2

A match in preheating region does not ignite until it is moved to the inner cone
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 • Basic features of laminar premixed flames

Fuel/Air Ratio Fuel lean Stochiometric Fuel rich Very fuel rich

Deep Violet Blue Green Yellow

Flame colour, due to large due to large due to carbon
concentrations concentrations particles
i.e. colour of the of excited CH of C2 species
outer cone radicals
High-T burned
gases usually
show a reddish
glow due to
radiation from
CO2 and H2O

Flame characteristics for hydrocarbon-air stochiometric mixtures

• The flame is ~1 mm thick and moves at ~0.5 m/s
• Pressure drop through the flame is very small: ~1 Pa
• Temperature in reaction zone is ~2200-2600 K
• Density ratio of reactants to products is ~7
• 2 sub regions exist: a fast chemistry zone, dominated by bimolecular
reactions, and a slow chemistry zone (CO+OH=CO2+H)
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 • Kinematic balance for a steady oblique flame

Thermal expansion through the flame front

• Normal component of velocity vector
u
vn u  vn b vn ,b  vn ,u
b
• Tangential component of velocity vector

vt ,u  vt ,b
• At steady-state the burning velocity equals
the flow velocity of the unburnt mixture
normal to the flame front

S L,u  vn,u  vu sin 

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Species Lei
H2 0.3
OH 0.7
H2O 0.9
CH4 1
O2 1.1
CO2 1.4

 thermal diffusivity
Lei  
c p Di mass diffusivity

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 • Thermal theory of Mallard and Le Chatelier: Extra
The flame consists of two zones:
• Pre-heat zone: the unburned gases are
heated by conduction and reach ignition
• Reaction zone: chemical enthalpy is
converted into sensible enthalpy

Energy balance on preheat zone:

m c p Ti  Tu   
Tb  Ti    u SL
m
r
Laminar flame-front thickness:
1
 r  SL r  SL w is a mean reaction rate, evaluated at Ti
w
Laminar flame speed:

   Tb  Ti  T  T 
SL    w  b i w
  c  T  T  Ti  Tu 
 u p  i u
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 Example: Evaluate SL for a n-th order homogeneous chemical reaction: Extra
The reaction rate for species i (reactant) is ginen by:
dCi
w  kCi or, in terms of molar fractions:
n

dt
dX i p
 kXi p n1 being Ci  X i
n

dt R T
The laminar flame speed dependence on pressure is then:

1
SL  p n 1  p n2
u

• For 2-nd order reactions, laminar flame speed is not affected by pressure
• Most of elementary reactions are second order reactions

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 • Comprehensive theory of Zeldovich, Frank-Kamenetsky and Semenov Extra

This theory is based on Mallard and Le Chatelier’s idea but takes into account:
• Species conservation
• Energy equation
Basic assumptions of the theory

• 1-D and steady flame

• The pressure is constant
Species Lei
• Specific heat and thermal conductivity are constant
H2 0.3
OH 0.7
• Unity lewis number Le   thermal diffusivit y
 H2O 0.9
c p Di mass diffusivit y
i
CH4 1
O2 1.1
• Lean-fuel conditions and first order reaction rate
CO2 1.4
 E 
wF  AT  exp    F YF
 RT 
• Ti is replaced with Tb in the estimation of reaction rates
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 Species and energy conservation
Extra
T  Tb 
 dYF  d 2YF
YF  YF ,b  u SL  2
 wF
dx c p dx

dT  d 2T wF Qr
 u S L  
dx c p dx2 cp
x
x0 x  

What do we get?: Laminar flame speed

2A  Tu  RTb2  exp  E / RTb 

2

SL    
u c p  Tb  E  Tb  Tu 2 Species Flame speed (cm/s)
CO 29
H2 is characterized by the maximum flame speed:
CH4 43
• H2 diffusivity is much greater than that of
C2H6 44
hydrocarbon fuels. C4H10 45
LeH2<<LeCH4 C3H8 46

• H2 kinetics is very fast compared to that of C6H6 48

C2H2 144
hydrocarbon fuels which includes CO oxidation step
H2 170
(slowest step in fuel oxidation)
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 Detailed Analysis
 Numerical simulations of laminar premixed flames
employing both detailed chemical kinetics and
mixture transport properties
 Figure 8.10 shows the temperature distribution
and selected species mole-fraction profiles
through a 1-atm, stoichiometric, CH4–air flame,
simulated using CHEMKIN library codes with
GRI-Mech 2.11 methane combustion kinetics.

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 The CO concentration
has its peak value at
approximately the
same location where
the CH4 concentration
goes to zero, whereas
the CO2 concentration
at first lags the CO
concentration but
then continues to rise
as the CO is oxidized

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29 A. Mardani, Chapter 6, 2020.
 From Fig. 8.12, it is apparent that the early appearance of NO within the flame (0.5–
0.8 mm in Fig. 8.10d) is the result of passive diffusion since the production rate is
essentially zero in that region.

Nitric oxide production reaches a maximum at an axial location between the peak
CH and O-atom concentrations. It is likely that Fenimore and Zeldovich pathways
are both important here.
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 Factors influencing flame velocity and thickness
Extra
Effect of temperature and pressure (1)

SL

Laminar flame speed for stochiometric methane-air mixtures as a function of pressure

and reactants’ temperature

Laminar flame speed correlation for stochiometric methane-air mixtures

S L cm / s   10  3.71 10 4 Tu K  2  43  p atm 

0.5

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 Factors influencing flame velocity and thickness

Effect of temperature and pressure (2)

The slow-burning fuels (SL< 0.6 m/s) employed in gas turbines, such as
natural gas and vaporized kerosine, the observed pressure dependence
can be expressed as a simple law where x varies from 0.1 to 0.5

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 Flame speed peaks occur at
stochiometric or slightly fuel-rich
mixtures (1.05-1.10)

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 Extra
• Factors influencing flame velocity and thickness

We see that the laminar flame speed has a strong temperature dependence,
since global reaction orders for hydrocarbons are about 2, and apparent activation
energies are approximately 1.67E8J / kmol (40 kcal / gmol). For example, Eqn.
predicts the flame speed to increase by a factor of 3.64 when the unburned gas
temperature is increased from 300 K to 600 K.

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 • Factors influencing flame velocity and thickness Extra
Effect of Equivalence Ratio

Flame speed peaks occur at stochiometric or

slightly fuel-rich mixtures (1.05-1.10)
(highest burned gases temperatures)

S L    w Tb 
Exceptions: hydrogen and carbon monoxide

Effect of Fuel Molecular Structure

Flame speed is proportional to S   w

L


and, thus, it depends on Mw,:   f M w,F
1


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 Flame arrester Extra

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 Extra

Flame kernel development during single-pulse ignition of propane air

mixtures at φ = 1.0 (top), φ = 0.7 (middle), and φ = 0.6 (bottom). The third
lobe separates from the main kernel and is a precursor to flame quenching
for the lean mixtures. Each image frame has field of view: 22 mm × 16 mm.

C. Dumitrache et al., Control of Early Flame Kernel Growth by

54 A. Mardani, Chapter 6, 2020. Multi-Wavelength Laser Pulses for Enhanced Ignition,
DOI: 10.1038/s41598-017-10457-0
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 The End of Chapter 6

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