Gaseous combustion at high pressures. - Part VIII.—The explosion of methane with up to its own volume of oxygen at Initial pressures up to 150 atmospheres

In Part I of this series an account was given of the behaviour of methane on explosion with less than its own volume of oxygen at initial pressures between 8.5 and 31.26 atmospheres. It was shown to be in agreement with the “hydroxylation” theory of hydrocarbon combustion; moreover, the oxygen-affinity of methane was found to be far greater than that of either hydrogen or carbonic oxide in like circumstances. Other outstanding features of the experiments were (1) the formation of large quantities of both steam and carbon in explosions of 2CH4 + O2 mixtures, (2) the disappearance of free carbon from the products when the proportion of oxygen in the mixture exploded exceeded 40 per cent., (3) the occurrence of oxides of carbon and steam in the products of all the mixtures fired, and (4) that the proportion of the original oxygen appearing as steam in the cooled products was smaller with a 3CH4 + 2O2 mixture than with any other exploded between the limits 2CH4 + O2 and CH4 + O2 . These observations excited considerable interest on account of their theoretical importance and have since been much discussed.