Abstract
High velocity flows, as in aerospace applications require special techniques to stabilize and ignite diffusion flames. Some techniques focus on changing parameters like geometry, conditions of the flow, or fuel composition, but these techniques are usually too expensive or impossible due to major changes in the system. On the other hand, some techniques focus on generating a region of charged/excited species and active radicals upstream of the flame. That can substantially enhance the flame stability even under high strain rate or at lean-limit-flammability conditions. Repetitive nanosecond pulsed (RNP) discharge plasma is a nonthermal plasma technique with some remarkable potential to improve stability and ignitability of high velocity diffusion flames. This technique was used in previous papers in a plasma assisted coaxial inverse diffusion burner and showed some promising results by reducing the lift-off height and delaying detachment and blowout conditions. This burner is prepared to employ the discharges at the burner nozzle and simulate a single element of a multi-element methane burner. However, effectiveness of high-voltage high-frequency RNP plasma was limited by the mode of the discharge. During the tests, three different modes were observed at different combinations of plasma and flow conditions. These three modes are low energy corona, uniformly distributed plasma, and high-energy point-to-point discharge. Among these three, only well-distributed plasma significantly improved the flame. In other cases, plasma deployment was either ineffective or in some cases adversely affected the flame by producing undesirable turbulence advancing blow out. As a result, a comprehensive study of these modes is required. In this work, the transition between these three modes in a jet flame was discussed. It has been expressed as a function of plasma conditions, i.e. peak discharge voltage and discharge frequency. It was shown that increasing flow speed delays increases the voltage and frequency at which transition occurs from low-energy corona discharge to well distributed plasma discharge. Subsequently, the effective plasma conditions are thinned. On the other hand, by increasing the frequency of nanosecond discharges, the chance of unstable point-to-point discharges is decreased. In contrast, the discharge peak voltage causes two different consequences. If it is too low, the pulse intensity is too week that the system will experience no visible plasma discharges or the discharges will not pass the low-energy corona, no matter how high the frequency is. If too high, it will enhance the chance of point-to-point discharges and limits the stabilization outcome of the system. Therefore, an optimal region is found for peak discharge voltage.