Reflight of the Solid Surface Combustion Experiment: Opposed-Flow Flame Spread Over Cylindrical Fuels

Although much has been learned about flame spreading at low gravity from recent experimental and theoretical efforts, understanding of the role of radiation heat transfer is limited. The difficulty lies in the fact that the modelling that must be done in concert with a limited number of low-gravity experiments to assist in interpretation of experimental results is complicated by several factors when radiation is involved. Although the process of radiative heat transfer is well described by the radiative transfer equation (RTE), the solution of the RTE itself is cumbersome, and almost always approximate due to, among other things, the three-dimensional nature of the radiative field, spectral and temperature dependence of properties, soot formation, turbulence-radiation interaction, and inhomogeneity of the medium.