An International Conference on Combustion: Summaries of the Papers read at a Colloquium held by the Advisory Group for Aeronautical Research and Development, North Atlantic Treaty Organization, at Cambridge, December 7 to 11, 1953

Abstract

The complete system of equations for a theory of laminar flame equations is presented, taking into account both heat conduction and diffusion, and for the case of an arbitrary number of simultaneous reactions. The eigen value problem determining the flame velocity is formulated. Two examples are given in order to show that explicit analytical expressions for the flame velocity can be obtained, which are in good agreement with the results obtained by numerical integration of the equations. In the first example (hydrazine decomposition) one reaction is considered as global reaction. In the second example (ozone decomposition) a hypothesis is introduced for the concentration of the free radical O, which corresponds to the steady‐state approximation generally used in classical chemical kinetics. In both cases the measured flame velocities are between the flame velocities computed with no diffusion, and with a coefficient estimated by Professor Hirschfelder from the kinetic theory of gases. The approximate explicit formulae are obtained without drastic assumptions and using legitimate approximation methods. The assumption used for the ozone decomposition flame has a bearing on a better understanding of the mechanism of chain reactions in general. The method indicated in the paper gives hope that the more complicated chain reactions such as the combustion of hydrocarbons will also be made accessible to theoretical computation.

Citation

(1954), "An International Conference on Combustion: Summaries of the Papers read at a Colloquium held by the Advisory Group for Aeronautical Research and Development, North Atlantic Treaty Organization, at Cambridge, December 7 to 11, 1953", Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology, Vol. 26 No. 2, pp. 55-57. https://doi.org/10.1108/eb032394