The aim of the present work is to analyze experimentally
and theoretically
the deflagrations in a closed duct of mixtures in which natural gas
is enriched with hydrogen or diluted with helium. In the first case,
hydrogen would increase the flame propagation velocity, while in the
second case, helium should make the mixture less reactive. The characterization
of these mixtures is carried out with the help of Lewis (Le) and Zeldovich (Ze) numbers. Therefore, eight mixtures
were considered. These mixtures covered a Le interval
from 0.60 to 1.36 and a Ze interval from 4.24 to
8.45. Moreover, the mixtures involved species such as natural gas,
hydrogen, helium, and air. It was observed that higher dimensionless
flame tip velocities were obtained for mixtures with Le below unity. For mixtures with similar Le numbers,
it was observed that lower Ze numbers produced higher
velocities. A theoretical model available in the literature was applied
and compared with the experimental data obtained in the present work
for the dimensionless flame speed. It was noticed that the model presented
greater discrepancies for mixtures with Le different
from unity. The model was also applied to predict the evolution of
the dimensionless flame tip position and was compared with published
experimental data. Inaccuracies were observed for this comparison.
In addition, two possible modifications of the existing theoretical
model for determining the evolution of the dimensionless flame tip
position are presented and validated in this paper. One of them showed
good accuracy.