Auto-ignition characteristics of high-pressure diesel spray in the controllable active thermo-atmos-phere (CATA) were studied with a high-speed camera video system. Multi-point autoignition phe-nomenon of diesel spray in the CATA was observed and the influence factors of the autoignition were analyzed. The stabilization mechanisms of the spray flame in different coflow temperatures were also discussed. The stabilization of the flames was controlled by different factors: autoignition phenomenon in low coflow temperature and flame spread in high coflow temperature. The test results also show that the autoignition delay depends strongly on the coflow temperature and has nonlinear relationship with the temperature. Autoignition delay decreases by almost 10 ms from 16.9 to 7.1 ms when the coflow temperature increases from 996 to 1048 K and only 4 ms from 1048 to 1101 K. The injection parameters in terms of nozzle diameter, injection pressure and pump speed, have some effects on autoignition delay while these effects depend on the coflow temperature. The significant effect lies in low coflow temperature. The injection parameters influence the autoignition delay because it can shorten the physical delay by improving the spray quality and enlarging the spray angle or penetration rate to im-prove mixture quality.
