Preliminary Flame Acceleration Tests in the Detonation Research Test Facility (DRTF) at Texas A&M University

The Detonation Research Test Facility (DRTF) is a 150-meter long, 2-meter diameter detonation tube in operation on the RELLIS Campus at Texas A&M University. The downstream end exhausts into a 68-meter long, 9-meter diameter "muffler" to contain exiting product gases. A major objective of this facility is to investigate how deflagrations, detonations, and deflagration-to- detonation transition (DDT) vary from what is measured in smaller systems. Preliminary DDT tests have been performed with stoichiometric methane-air mixtures at atmospheric pressure in short sections of the tube equipped with turbulence-generating obstacles. Shock-flame complexes with velocities exceeding 800 m/s and pressures of up to 18 bar were observed in the first 50 meters section of the tube. These large-scale results are presented and compared to existing DDT scaling laws developed from numerical simulations and extrapolations from smaller experimental facilities.