A wide ranging experimental and kinetic modeling study of TMEDA pyrolysis and oxidation

Traditional liquid propellants like unsymmetrical dimethylhydrazine include several issues, such as toxicity, short storage time and preservation difficulty at low temperatures. For this reason, exploring green and stable propellant fuels is imperative in the development of propellants. Tetramethyl ethylenediamine (TMEDA) is considered to be a promising green propellant fuel with high specific impulse, non-toxicity, and long-term storage stability. Thus, investigating the combustion characteristics of TMEDA and constructing a detailed chemical kinetic mechanism are of fundamental importance in describing its combustion in computational fluid simulation. For this work, ignition delay times of TMEDA were measured in a shock tube at equivalent ratios of 0.5, 1.0 and 2.0, at pressures of 2, 10, and 20 bar, and in the temperature range of 870–1500 K with fixed fuel concentration at 2 %. After the reflected shock at 990–1500 K, the pyrolysis products of 2000 and 5000 ppm TMEDA in Argon were also measured at 5 and 10 bar conditions in a single pulse shock tube. In addition, laminar flame speeds of TMEDA were measured at initial pressures of 1 bar, initial temperatures of 333 and 353 K, and equivalence ratios ranging from 0.8 to 1.5 in a constant volume reactor. The experimental results were simulated using a detailed TMEDA kinetic mechanism. Reaction path analysis and sensitivity analysis were provided to clarify the chemical kinetics of TMEDA oxidation and pyrolysis. The current work provides new experimental data and fundamental analyses for understanding the oxidation and pyrolysis characteristics of TMEDA, and sheds light on optimal directions for future models.