Effect of polymer ablation on temperature decay of thermal plasmas using induction thermal plasma irradiation technique

Polymer ablation phenomenon by thermal plasmas was fundamentally investigated using the inductively coupled thermal plasma irradiation technique. It is greatly important to understand interactions between a thermal plasma and polymer materials, for example, for design of low voltage and high voltage circuit breakers. In the present experiment, the Ar induction thermal plasma was directly irradiated to different five kinds of polymer solid bulks. Spectroscopic observation was carried out to measure C₂ spectra, and the C₂ vibrational-rotational temperatures were estimated in different polymer ablated vapors. In addition, the measured mass loss and power loss due to ablation were compared among the different five polymer materials. Result showed that the polymethylene needed the highest power loss for ablation although there is little difference in the vibrational temperatures near the polymer surface among the five polymer materials.