Numerical investigation of the effect of reactive gas jets on the flame acceleration and DDT process

Abstract

Jet obstacles can quickly induce the deflagration to detonation transition (DDT) process and reduce the thrust loss of an engine. However, there are few studies on the use of combustible premixed gases as the reactive jet obstacle. Based on the OpenFOAM platform, a detailed numerical investigation of the flame acceleration and DDT process is carried out with different initial jet velocities and the number of jet obstacles. The results show that, although the stronger flame generated by the reactive jet obstacles will reduce the virtual blockage ratio to a greater extent, the turbulence and combustion heat release effect generated by them still significantly promote the flame acceleration. In terms of flame acceleration, initially, increasing the initial jet velocity has no obvious effect on the flame acceleration. Later, turbulence and combustion heat release begin to dominate the flame acceleration and significantly promote the flame acceleration. Since the jets in this study adopt the same combustible premixed gases, increasing the number of reactive jet obstacles downstream does not improve the upstream flame acceleration. In DDT, increasing the initial velocity of the reactive jet can improve the detonation initiation, but the effect of the obstacle number on DDT is greatly affected by the initial jet velocity. Specifically, at a low initial jet velocity, more jet obstacles can significantly promote the detonation initiation, while at a high initial jet velocity, the enhanced turbulence caused by the jet is the dominant factor for the flame acceleration. Therefore, compared with the number of jet obstacles, the detonation initiation process of the premixed gases is more sensitive to the change in the initial jet velocity.