Combustion behavior of a falling sodium droplet: Burning rate-constant and drag coefficient

Abstract

The combustion behavior of a single sodium droplet has been studied experimentally, by use of a falling droplet. It was found that D2-law can hold for the sodium droplet combustion after the ignition, which can be observed to occur through an increase in the droplet temperature under a condition without a gaseous flame, suggesting that a surface reaction plays an important role in the ignition of sodium. It was also found that the burning rate-constant without forced convection has nearly the same value as those for conventional hydrocarbon droplets, although it is considered that the sodium combustion proceeds in an oxidizer-rich environment even in the air. This can be judged by comparing a temporal variation of the flame/droplet diameter ratio for the sodium droplet with that for the hydrocarbon droplet. A micro-explosion of the burning droplet is also observed when oxygen concentration in the ambience exceeds 0.33 in mass fraction. As for the falling velocity and/or distance of the burning droplet, it turned out that the use of the drag coefficient for solid sphere under isothermal condition is inappropriate in obtaining accurate values. It was also found in another experiment that when Re > 500, the drag coefficient of the falling droplet undergoing combustion is as high as 2 depending on combustion situation and/or droplet temperature, while that of the solid sphere under an isothermal condition is 0.44. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Heat Trans Asian Res, 34(7): 481–495, 2005; Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI 10.1002/htj.20084