Experimental and numerical investigation of ester droplet combustion: Application to butyl acetate

This paper presents an experimental and numerical study of the combustion of isolated n -butyl acetate droplets in the standard atmosphere. Numerical simulations are reported using a model that incorporates unsteady gas and liquid transport, variable properties, and radiation. Three skeletal mechanisms of n -butyl acetate, derived from a large detailed mechanism comprised of 819 species and 52,698 reactions, were used in the numerical simulations to evaluate the influence of the kinetic mechanism on burning. The reduced mechanisms comprised 212 species and 5413 reactions, 157 species and 3089 reactions, and 105 species and 1035 reactions. The numerical model did not include soot formation, though qualitatively mild sooting was noted only for droplets larger than 0.7 mm. The numerical predictions were in good agreement with experi-mental measurements of droplet and flame diameters. Flame extinction was numerically predicted which was attributed to a decrease of the characteristic diffusion time relative to the chemical time as droplet burned. Effects of initial droplet diameter on the evolution of maximum gas temperature (Tmax) and peak mole frac-tions of CO2 and CO are also examined numerically.& COPY; 2022 Published by Elsevier Inc. on behalf of The Combustion Institute.

Automated summary

This paper presents an experimental and numerical study on the combustion of isolated n-butyl acetate droplets in the standard atmosphere. Numerical simulations with a model incorporating unsteady gas and liquid transport, variable properties, and radiation were conducted. The influence of different kinetic mechanisms on burning was evaluated. The numerical predictions were validated by experimental measurements, and the effects of initial droplet diameter on the maximum gas temperature and peak mole fractions of CO2 and CO were examined.