Me and my friends are doing a project over how when you blow flour into a flame, it catches on fire.?

Question

I need a explanation on why when you blow flour through a tube and into the flame it makes the flour flame up.

Answer 1

Flour is very flammable. To have fire you need heat, oxygen and fuel. In this case the flour is the fuel. By blowing the flour from a tube it spreads out allowing a good supply of oxygen to surround the tiny particles. Flour in a solid mass only has a small area exposed to the air so the lack of supply of oxygen prevents it burning quickly. Finally the flame provides the heat so the flour catches alight and burns very quickly.

Please be careful to only use small amounts of flour. Flour can explode in these conditions. Indeed flour mills have blown up because the movement of the flour has caused a small static electricity spark which then ignited the flour in the air which then exploded.

Answer 2

look up fuel air bomb, same principle just with flour instead of fuel.