A Relationship between the Flash Point, Boiling Point and the Lean
Limit of Flammability of Liquid Fuels
Combustion Science and Technology, 31 (5&6):
297--302 (1983)DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00102208308923647
Abstract
The premise: of this paper is that a flame would flash over the surface
of a liquid fuel, upon subjecting to Ian external ignition source,
only if the (fuel vapor+air) mixture in gas phase contains enough
fuel to be above the lean limit. Based on this coupling between thermodynamics
and chemical kinetics, the lean limit is shown to be related to the
flash point temperature through the fuel's latent heat of vaporization
and boiling point temperature. The deduced relationship is applied
to a wide collection of hydrocarbon and carbohydrate liquid fuels
to discover that the postulated hypothesis bears merit for further
study to benefit both the state-of-the-art of liquid ignition and
the rationale underlying the ASTM standard tests for flash point
measurement.