Study of synthesis and combustion of composite fuels based on n-decane and Al nanoparticles

The article is devoted to the analysis of a diffusion combustion of a composite fuel (formed by an addition of non-oxidized aluminum (Al) nanoparticles (NP’s) to n-decane) with oxygen. The process of obtaining Al NP’s consisted of a laser fragmentation of initially large commercially produced NP’s (so called “Alex” with mean diameter is about 450 nm) in the solution of isopropanol. A final size distribution of NP’s was determined by a CPS DC2400 measuring disk centrifuge. The morphology of NP’s was characterized with the Transmission Electron Microscope (TEM) JEM-100C. The measured average diameter of NP’s was about 40 nm. In the final step of a preparation of a composite fuel an isopropanol was exchanged on n-decane. To characterize the composite fuel, diffusion combustion was used in combination with the laser diagnostic technique CARS. Temperature distributions along the x direction were measured at two values of distances from the nozzle. It has been shown that, for the fuel consistent of 0.1% mass concentration of Al NP’s in n-decane, the temperature at the distance equaled 14 mm downstream from the nozzle exit of a burner in the vicinity of the flame front was significantly higher (by 200–300 K) than that upon burning of pure n-decane.