Oxidation of carbon at high temperatures - Reaction-rate control or transport control

Abstract

In spite of a general acceptance in making predictions of ablation r a t e that the oxidation r a t e of carbon is limited a t temperatures of about 1650 K or above by the r a t e of oxygen transport to the carbon surface, a large body of existing experimental data on the carbon-oxygen reaction indicates that this may not be so.cate a distinct departure from simple Arrhenius behavior and even a maximum in the r a t e curve as a function of temperature.These data have been analyzed and compared with theoretical maximum stagnation-point transport -limited r a t e s ; this comparison has shown that even at very high temperatures, in many situations the r a t e of chemical reaction is considerably below the theoretical maximum transport-limited rate.oxygen reaction may be chemically controlled in many situations at much higher temperat u r e s than previously suspected.Furthermore, these data indi-Hence, the carbon-7.