Methane-air explosion pressures in cylindrical interconnected containers with different dimensions

The characteristics of methane-air explosion in interconnected containers with different dimensions are studied in this paper, and the prediction models are established. The explosion apparatus consists of two cylindrical containers and a connecting pipe, and three structure parameters are selected as influencing factors for the experiments. The explosion pressure, the maximum rate of pressure rise and pressure growth index under different conditions are compared by changing the volume ratio (V₁/V₂), the length of the pipe, and the inner diameter of the pipe. During the experiment, the combustion and explosion of gas developed from the main container to the auxiliary container. Under different size effect conditions, the maximum explosion pressure in the secondary container was always higher than the maximum explosion pressure in the primary container. The maximum explosion pressure and the maximum rate of pressure rise in the primary and secondary containers both increase with increasing pipe length. With an increase in the pipe diameter, the maximum explosion pressure and the maximum rate of pressure rise both decrease gradually. When the volume ratio changes, the parameters such as the maximum explosion pressure are also affected by the volume changes of the containers at both ends. Therefore, the explosion parameters in both connected containers do not show a single development trend with the increase of the volume ratio. For practical application, in order to reduce the explosion intensity and protect the device, large-diameter pipes should be used and the volume ratio should be reduced.