skip to main content
OSTI.GOV title logo U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Title: The combustion kinetics of octane isomers

Conference ·
OSTI ID:5741798
 [1]; ;  [2]
  1. Technion-Israel Inst. of Tech., Haifa (Israel). Faculty of Aerospace Engineering
  2. Lawrence Livermore National Lab., CA (United States)

Shock tube experiments provide conditions for testing kinetic models that are unique, since this is the only common environment in which initiation reactions, primarily the unimolecular decompositions of the fuel, play an important role. At least two factors are known to be very important, the fuel molecule size and its precise structure. Iso-octane has an octane number of 100, which reflects the relative difficulty with which iso-octanes/air mixtures ignite. Conversely, C{sub 8}H{sub 18}, the straight chain n-octane, ignites very easily, with an octane number of approximately zero. The present work addresses the importance of fuel structure for large hydrocarbon fuels, by comparing the ignition of isomers of octane under shock tube conditions. Ignition delay times were performed with n-octane, a linear chain molecular with only primary and secondary C-H bonds, 2-3-4-trimethyl-pentane has a highly branched molecule and contains only primary and tertiary C-H bonds, and iso-octane a molecule which includes a mixture of primary, secondary, and tertiary C-H bonds. Also 1-octene, a simple straight chain alkene was included. The experiments were run in a single pulse stainless steel shock tube. 475 shocks were performed. They were spread as follows: (1) 164 experiments with 1-octene (C{sub 8}H{sub 16}). (2) 137 experiments with 2,2,4 tri-methyl pentane. (3) 30 experiments with 2,3,4 tri-methyl pentane. (4) 144 experiments with n-octane. 3 refs.

Research Organization:
Lawrence Livermore National Lab., CA (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE; USDOE, Washington, DC (United States)
DOE Contract Number:
W-7405-ENG-48
OSTI ID:
5741798
Report Number(s):
UCRL-JC-104066; CONF-9003312-1; ON: DE92008929
Resource Relation:
Conference: 6. Israeli combustion meeting, Beer-Sheva (Israel), 29 Mar 1990
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English