FREE-CONVECTION STAGNATION-POINT BOUNDARY-LAYERS DRIVEN BY CATALYTIC SURFACE-REACTIONS .1. THE STEADY-STATES

The free convection boundary-layer flow near a stagnation point driven by catalytic surface heating is considered. The case without fuel consumption is treated first, and it is shown that the steady state equations admit multiple solutions. Explicit expressions can be obtained for these solution branches and it is found that a hysteresis point occurs when the activation energy parameter epsilon=1/5. The effect of fuel consumption is seen to be characterised by the dimensionless parameter alpha and numerical results are obtained for a range of values of alpha and epsilon, as well as Prandtl number sigma and Schmidt number S-c. Multiple solutions are again observed and analytic expressions for the bifurcation points can be found when sigma = S-c. For sigma not equal S-c these have to be determined numerically.