Abstract

In this paper, the critical energies required for direct initiation of spherical detonations in four gaseous fuels (C2H2, C2H4, C3H8 and H2)–oxygen mixtures at different initial pressures, equivalence ratios and with different amounts of argon dilution are reported. Using these data, a scaling analysis is performed based on two main parameters of the problem: the explosion length R o that characterizes the blast wave and a characteristic chemical length that characterizes the detonation. For all the undiluted mixtures considered in this study, it is found that the relationship is closely given by Ro26 , where λ is the characteristic detonation cell size of the explosive mixture. While for C2H2–2.5O2 mixtures highly diluted with argon, in which cellular instabilities are shown to play a minor role on the detonation propagation, the proportionality factor increases to 37.3, 47 and 54.8 for 50, 65 and 70% argon dilution, respectively. Using the ZND induction length Δ I as the characteristic chemical length scale for argon diluted or ‘stable’ mixtures, the explosion length is also found to scale adequately with Ro2320I .