Theory of Weakly Exothermic Oblique Detonations

Abstract

A simplified formulation, based on treating the ratio of the heat release to the postshock thermal enthalpy as a small parameter, accommodating arbitrary chemistry descriptions, is shown to reproduce computationally the same variety of phenomena as more complex formulations for oblique detonations with supersonic postshock flow. The resulting small relative variations of velocity and thermodynamic properties across the reaction region are described by linearized Euler equations written in characteristic form, supplemented by the linearized Rankine-Hugoniot jump conditions across the leading shock. The simplified formulation is used to analyze the interaction of the oblique detonation with a weak vortex sheet, for an Arrhenius irreversible reaction with an activation energy large compared with the postshock thermal enthalpy. The analysis reveals that, as ß, the product of the activation energy and the heat release divided by the square of the postshock thermal enthalpy, increases through values of order unity, decaying spatial oscillations, found for small values, are replaced by persistent nonlinear oscillations of finite amplitude for larger values. Beyond a critical value of ß the growth of the oscillation amplitude leads to the development of a singularity at the shock, an explosion, consistent with the formation of a triple point. Many related problems can be clarified with this formulation.