Explosion Temperatures of Metals and Other Elemental Dust Clouds

The Pittsburgh Research Laboratory of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health conducted a study of the explosibility of various metals and other elemental dusts dispersed in air, with a focus on the experimental explosion temperatures. The data are useful for understanding the basics of dust cloud combustion, as well as for evaluating the explosion hazards in the minerals and metals processing industries. The dusts studied included boron, carbon, magnesium, aluminum, silicon, sulfur, titanium, chromium, iron, nickel, copper, zinc, niobium, molybdenum, tin, hafhium, tantalum, tungsten, and lead. The dusts were chosen to cover a wide range of physical properties from the more volatile materials such as magnesium, aluminum, sulfur, and zinc to the highly "refractory" (very low volatility) elements such as carbon, niobium, molybdenum, tantalum, and tungsten. These flammability studies were conducted in a 20-L chamber, using strong pyrotechc ignitors. The experimental data obtained included the minimum explosible concentrations, maximum explosion pressures, and maximum explosion temperatures. A unique multiwavelength infrared pyrometer was used to measure the temperatures. For the elemental dusts studied, all ignited and burned as air-dispersed dust clouds except for nickel, copper, molybdenum, and lead. The measured maximum explosion temperatures ranged from -1 550 K for tin and tungsten powders to -2800 K for aluminum, magnesium, and titanium powders. The measured temperatures are compared to the calculated, adiabatic flame temperatures. In general, the dusts whose experimental temperatures were closer . to the adiabatic values were those with the finer particle sizes, those that were more easily vaporized, and/or those that were intrinsically more reactive. Disclaimer: The findings and conclusions in this report are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the yiews of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. 1, Introduction This paper will concentrate on the explosion characteristics of metal and nonmetal elemental dusts. These dusts are important from both the practical and fundamental points of view. These metal and nonmetal elements are often used or occur in industry as powders or . dusts, and an evaluation of their possible explosion hazards is important. In addition, the elemental dusts are ideal for studying the fundamental physicochemical processes occurring during combustion because they are pure, uniform substances with well-characterized phase transitions and thermodynamic properties. This is in marked contrast to the complex structures and heterogeneous chemistry associated with the combustion of carbonaceous materials such as coal and grain dusts. The elemental dusts also display a marked variation of reaction 'contact author: Kenneth L. Cashdollar, NOSH, Pittsburgh Research Laboratory, P.O. Box 18070, Cochrans Mill Road, Pittsburgh, PA 15236, phone 4 12-3 86-6753, fax 4 12-3 86-6595, e-mail [email protected]. exothemicities in air and an enormous range in vapor pressures at their respective flame temperatures. In the 1960's and earlier, the U.S. Bureau of Mines at Pittsburgh studied the explosibility of metal dusts using a cylindrical 1.2-L Hartrnann chamber (Jacobson, Cooper, & Nagy, 1964) with an electric spark ignition source. More recent Pittsburgh Research Laboratory (PRL) studies used a nearly-spherical 20-L chamber and much stronger pyrotechnic ignitors to study the explosibility of metal and other elemental dusts (Hertzberg, Zlochower, & Cashdollar, 1991 ; Hertzberg, Zlochower, & Cashdollar, 1992; Cashdollar, 1994). The current paper is a continuation of these pRL2 studies, with an emphasis on experimental explosion temperatures measured with a six-channel ineared (IR) pyrometer. The current paper is also complementary to an earlier experimental study of coal dust explosion temperatures (Cashdollar & Hertzberg, 1983), using the same IR pyrometer. Other explosion characteristics measured for the metal and other elemental dusts included minimum explosible concentrations (lean flammable limits), maximum explosion pressures, and rates of pressure rise. In h s paper, the terms "flammability" and "explosibility" are used interchangeably to refer to the ability of an airborne dust cloud to propagate an explosion after it has been initiated by a sufficiently strong ignition source. The explosions observed were rapid deflagrations, not detonations. The infrared temperatures and other experimental explosion data provide evidence to evaluate the general mechanisms of homogeneous versus heterogeneous combustion of these elemental dusts. Some preliminary metal explosion temperature data for iron dust are in Cashdollar (1994; 2000). 2. Experimental Equipment and Test Procedures The dust flammability experiments in this paper were conducted in the PRL 20-L laboratory chamber (Cashdollar & Hertzberg, 1982a; Cashdollar, 1994), which has been used extensively to study the explosibility of various dusts. The chamber (Fig. 1) is near-spherical in shape and made of stainless steel, with a pressure rating of 21 bar. The vertical cross section is merely a schematic that is meant to show the chamber itself and the vertical positioning of the instrumentation; the positions of the instrumentation around the circumference are shown in the horizontal cross section. The chamber top is hinged and opens across the full chamber diameter. The hinged top is attached by six : -in (1 9-mm) diameter bolts which are not shown on the drawings. Two PRL optical dust probes (Liebman, Conti, & Cashdollar, 1977; Cashdollar, Liebman, & Conti, 198 1) were used to measure the uniformity of the dust dispersion at the positions shown in Fig. 1. The optical probes measured the transmission through the dust cloud. Thin jets of air kept the probe windows dust-free. For the majority of the tests, one dust probe with a 3 8-rnm path length and a second dust probe with a 95-mm path length were used. The longer path length is more suitable for dusts with higher densities and larger particle sizes. The strain gauge pressure transducer measured the absolute explosion pressure and rate of pressure rise. The patented six-channel 1R pyrometer (Cashdollar, Hertzberg, & Litton, 1979; Cashdollar & Hertzberg, 1982b) measured the explosion temperatures by observing the flame radiation through the sapphire window in the top of the 20-L chamber. The pyrometer uses room 2 The majority of this research was conducted in the early 1990s when the PRL was part of the U.S. Bureau of Mines before its transfer to the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) in 1996. d g n i t i o n point (Pressure transducer