Periodic motion of a Bunsen flame tip with burner rotation

Date Published
07/2003
Publication Type
Journal Article
Authors
DOI
10.1016/S0010-2180(03)00082-8
Abstract

Effects of burner rotation on the shapes and dynamics of premixed Bunsen flames have been investigated experimentally in normal gravity and in microgravity. Mixtures of CH4-air and C3H8-air are issued from the burner tube with mean flow velocity U = 0.6 m/s. The burner tube is rotated up to 1400 rpm (swirl number S = 1.58). An oscillating flame with large amplitude is formed between a conical-shape flame and a plateau flame under the condition of Lewis number Le > 1 mixtures (rich CH4-air and lean C3H8-air mixtures). In contrast, for Le ≤ 1 mixtures (lean CH4-air and rich C3H8-air), asymmetric, eccentric flame or tilted flame is formed under the same swirl number range. Under microgravity condition, the oscillating flames are not formed, indicating that the oscillation is driven by buoyancy-induced instability associated with the unstable interface between the hot products and the ambient air. The flame tip flickering frequency ν is insensitive to burner rotation for S < 0.11. For S > 0.11, ν decreases linearly with increasing S. As S exceeds 0.11, a minimum value of axial mean velocity along the center line uj,m due to flow divergence is found and it has a linear relationship with ν. This result shows that uj,m has direct control of the oscillation frequency. When S approaches unity, the flame oscillation amplitude increases by a factor of 5, compared to the flickering amplitude of a conical-shape flame. This is accompanied by a hysteresis variation in the flame curvature from positive to negative and the thermo-diffusive zone thickness varying from small to large. With S > 1.3, the plateau flame has the same small flickering amplitudes as with S = 0. These results show that the competing centrifugal and buoyancy forces, and the non-unity Lewis number effect, play important roles in amplifying the flame-tip oscillation.

Journal
Combustion And Flame
Volume
134
Year of Publication
2003
Issue
1-2
Pagination
67-79
Keywords
Organizations
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