A numerical model is developed to examine laminar flame spread and extinction over a thin solid fuel in lowspeed concurrent flows. The model provides a more precise fluid-mechanical description of the flame by incorporating an elliptic treatment of the upstream flame stabilization zone near the fuel burnout point. Parabolic equations are used to treat the downstream flame, which has a higher flow Reynolds number. The parabolic and elliptic regions are coupled smoothly by an appropriate matching of boundary conditions. The solid phase consists of an energy equation with surface radiative loss and a surface pyrolysis relation. Steady spread with constant flame and pyrolysis lengths is found possible for thin fuels and this facilitates the adoption of a moving coordinate system attached to the flame with the flame spread rate being an eigen value. Calculations are performed in purely forced flow in a range of velocities which are lower than those induced in a normal gravity buoyant environment. Both quenching and blowoff extinction are observed. The results show that as flow velocity or oxygen percentage is reduced, the flame spread rate, the pyrolysis length, and the flame length all decrease, as expected. The flame standoff distance from the solid and the reaction zone thickness, however, first increase with decreasing flow velocity, but eventually decrease very near the quenching extinction limit. The short, diffuse flames observed at low flow velocities and oxygen levels are consistent with available experimental data. The maximum flame temperature decreases slowly at first as flow velocity is reduced, then falls more steeply close to the quenching extinction limit. Low velocity quenching occurs as a result of heat loss. At low velocities, surface radiative loss becomes a significant fraction of the total combustion heat release. In addition, the shorter flame length causes an increase in the fraction of conduction downstream compared to conduction to the fuel. The...

Microgravity experiments are performed to study wind-assisted flame spread over discrete fuel elements. Ultra-thin cellulose-based fuel segments are distributed uniformly in a low-speed flow and flame spread is initiated by igniting the most upstream fuel segment. Similar to continuous fuels, flame spread over discrete fuels is a continual process of ignition. Flame propagation across a gap only occurs when a burning fuel segment, before it burns out, ignites the subsequent segment. During this process, gaps between samples reduce the fuel load, increasing the apparent flame spread rate and decreasing the heat transfer between adjacent segments. The reduction in heat transfer decreases the solid burning rate. In this study, sample segment length, gap size, and imposed flow velocity are varied to study the impacts on burning characteristics, including propensity of flame spread, flame spread rate, and solid burning rate. Detailed profiles of the transient flame spread process are also presented.