Combustion Reactions of Paraffin Components in Liquid Transportation Fuels Using Generic Rates

The approach of mechanism generation is the accepted one of assigning generic rates to reactions in the same class. The procedure has been successfully applied to higher paraffins that include detailed sub-models of n-hexane, cyclohexane, n-heptane, n-decane, n-dodecane, and n-hexadecane and semi-detailed submodels of iso-octane and methyl cyclohexane, in addition to reactions of aromatic formation and oxidation. Comparison between predictions and experimental data were found to be satisfactory for n-heptane, iso-octane, n-decane and gasoline premixed flames. The mechanism was also able to reproduce the measured concentrations for a n-hexadecane experiment in a jet stirred reactor. The numerical accuracy in predicting the flame structures of soot precursors, including acetylene and benzene, is one of the major foci of this study. The predicted maximum concentrations of acetylene and benzene are within 20% for most flames in this study.