ON MILD AND VIGOROUS OXIDATION OF MIXTURES OF CHLORINATED HYDROCARBONS IN DROPLET BURNING

Droplet burning with mixtures of nonane and the heavily chlorinated te trachloroethane (TECA) was studied computationally using a quasi-stead y, spherical diffusion flame model of simultaneous fuel vaporization, pyrolysis, and combustion, with detailed transport and a semidetailed reaction mechanism. The dependence of the droplet burning rate on the chlorine content was examined through the TECA concentration in the fu el mixture. It is shown that the model predicts reasonably well the in fluence of chlorine content on the d(2)-law burning rate constant expe rimentally determined in a previous study, and that the sharp decrease in the burning rate for fuel mixtures with Cl/H ratio around and grea ter than unity is caused by the reduction of heat release, as well as through the chemical inhibition by chlorine. The computational results also suggest the beneficial effect of water vapor in promoting burnin g. (C) 1997 by The Combustion Institute.