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As explained above, a deflagration is a subsonic reaction, whereas a detonation is a supersonic (greater than the sound speed of the material) reaction. Distinguishing between a deflagration or a detonation can be difficult to impossible to the casual observer.
Detonation (from Latin detonare 'to thunder down/forth') [1] is a type of combustion involving a supersonic exothermic front accelerating through a medium that eventually drives a shock front propagating directly in front of it.
Explosion of unserviceable ammunition and other military items The explosion of the Castle Bravo nuclear bomb. An explosion is a rapid expansion in volume of a given amount of matter associated with an extreme outward release of energy, usually with the generation of high temperatures and release of high-pressure gases. Explosions may also be ...
The radioactivity released at Chernobyl tended to be more long-lived than that released by a bomb detonation hence it is not possible to draw a simple comparison between the two events. Also, a dose of radiation spread over many years (as is the case with Chernobyl) is much less harmful than the same dose received over a short period.
Like light or sound waves, when a blast wave reaches a boundary between two materials, part of it is transmitted, part of it is absorbed, and part of it is reflected. The impedances of the two materials determine how much of each occurs. The equation for a Friedlander waveform describes the pressure of the blast wave as a function of time:
It states that the detonation propagates at a velocity at which the reacting gases just reach sonic velocity (in the frame of the leading shock wave) as the reaction ceases. [ 1 ] [ 2 ] David Chapman [ 3 ] and Émile Jouguet [ 4 ] originally (c. 1900) stated the condition for an infinitesimally thin detonation.
The phenomenon is exploited in pulse detonation engines, because a detonation produces a more efficient combustion of the reactants than a deflagration does, i.e. giving a higher yields. Such engines typically employ a Shchelkin spiral in the combustion chamber to facilitate the deflagration to detonation transition. [2] [3]
In spark-ignition internal combustion engines, knocking (also knock, detonation, spark knock, pinging or pinking) occurs when combustion of some of the air/fuel mixture in the cylinder does not result from propagation of the flame front ignited by the spark plug, but when one or more pockets of air/fuel mixture explode outside the envelope of the normal combustion front.