17.1.1 Overview

In premixed combustion, fuel and oxidizer are mixed at the molecular level prior to ignition. Combustion occurs as a flame front propagating into the unburnt reactants. Examples of premixed combustion include aspirated internal combustion engines, lean-premixed gas turbine combustors, and gas-leak explosions.

Premixed combustion is much more difficult to model than non-premixed combustion. The reason for this is that premixed combustion usually occurs as a thin, propagating flame that is stretched and contorted by turbulence. For subsonic flows, the overall rate of propagation of the flame is determined by both the laminar flame speed and the turbulent eddies. The laminar flame speed is determined by the rate that species and heat diffuse upstream into the reactants and burn. To capture the laminar flame speed, the internal flame structure would need to be resolved, as well as the detailed chemical kinetics and molecular diffusion processes. Since practical laminar flame thicknesses are of the order of millimeters or smaller, resolution requirements are usually unaffordable.

The effect of turbulence is to wrinkle and stretch the propagating laminar flame sheet, increasing the sheet area and, in turn, the effective flame speed. The large turbulent eddies tend to wrinkle and corrugate the flame sheet, while the small turbulent eddies, if they are smaller than the laminar flame thickness, may penetrate the flame sheet and modify the laminar flame structure.

Non-premixed combustion, in comparison, can be greatly simplified to a mixing problem (see the mixture fraction approach in this section in the separate Theory Guide). The essence of premixed combustion modeling lies in capturing the turbulent flame speed, which is influenced by both the laminar flame speed and the turbulence.

In premixed flames, the fuel and oxidizer are intimately mixed before they enter the combustion device. Reaction then takes place in a combustion zone that separates unburnt reactants and burnt combustion products. Partially premixed flames exhibit the properties of both premixed and diffusion flames. They occur when an additional oxidizer or fuel stream enters a premixed system, or when a diffusion flame becomes lifted off the burner so that some premixing takes place prior to combustion.

Premixed and partially premixed flames can be modeled using ANSYS FLUENT's finite-rate/eddy-dissipation formulation (see Chapter  15). If finite-rate chemical kinetic effects are important, , the Laminar Finite-Rate model (see this section in the separate Theory Guide), the EDC model (see this section in the separate Theory Guide) or the composition PDF transport model (see Chapter  19) can be used. For information about ANSYS FLUENT's partially premixed combustion model, see Chapter  18. If the flame is perfectly premixed, so only one stream at one equivalence ratio enters the combustor, it is possible to use the premixed combustion model, as described in this chapter.