Detonation cell size measurements and predictions in hydrogen-air-steam mixtures at elevated temperatures

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The effect of initial mixture temperature on the experimentally measured detonation cell size for hydrogen-air-steam mixtures at 0.1 MPa has been investigated. Experiments were carried out in a 10-cm-inner-diameter, 6.1-m-long heated detonation tube with a maximum operating temperature of 700 K and spatial temperature uniformity of ±14 K. Detonation cell size measurements provide clear evidence that the effect of hydrogen-air initial gas mixture temperature, in the range 300–650 K, is to decrease cell size and, hence, to increase the sensitivity of the mixture to undergo detonations. The effect of steam content, at any given temperature, is to increase the cell size and, thereby, to decrease the sensitivity of stoichiometric hydrogen-air mixtures. The hydrogen-air detonability limits for the 10-cm-inside-diamter test vessel, based upon the onset of single-head spin, decreased from 15% hydrogen at 300 K down to about 9% hydrogen at 650 K. The experimental detonation cell size data were correlated using a Zel'dovich-von Neumann-Döring (ZND) model for the detonation using detailed chemical-kinetic reaction mechanisms. The proportionality constants used to scale the reaction zone length calculations from the ZND model varied from 30 to 51 for the hydrogen-air cell size data at 650 and 300 K, respectively.