SI Combustion Characteristics of Cyclopentane - Detailed Kinetic Mechanism

Cyclopentane (C₅H₁₀) has been reported to exhibit large octane sensitivity (RON − MON) = 17. During the course of research for sustainable liquid fuels, fundamental SI combustion characteristics of cyclopentane have been investigated using the kinetic mechanism which has been newly developed based on the quantum chemical calculations for essential chemical species and reactions. It was found that the intramolecular isomerization reaction via six-membered ring transition states are significantly hindered by the cyclic carbon skeleton. As a result, the predicted ignition delay times at low temperature are longer than those for the acyclic hydrocarbons. The effect on the laminar flame propagation speed was found to be small.