• Aerospace Engineering and Technology
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.49-56
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• 2005

Hot firing performance test of hydrazine decomposition catalyst used for monopropellant thruster of the satellite and the launch vehicle was performed. Test equipment for catalyst test was developed in collaboration with Hanwha Corp., reaction delay time, catalyst activity and granule stability of the catalyst firing performance were measured and analyzed with the equipment. In addition, the current development of prototype catalyst is introduced.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers Conference
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• 2008.11a
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• pp.72-77
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• 2008

The function of the Reaction Control System include roll, pitch and yaw control of the launch vehicles and fine control maneuvers and precision upper stage orientation before separation of one or more payload. This paper describes the overview of commercial launchers, current technology trend for RCS of launch vehicles, and development status of medium class thruster for RCS.

• Aerospace Engineering and Technology
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• v.4 no.2
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• pp.203-208
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• 2005

Electronic components for space launch vehicles are exposed to a severe vibrational environment at launch and flight. The structural reliability of each component can be verified using mathematical approaches. In order to verify the structural reliability, an important parameter is the natural frequency of PCB(Printed Circuit Board) assembly mounted electronic components on and housing mounted PCB assembly in. In this paper, in order to find natural frequencies of PCB assemblies and the housing of hydrazine TCU(Thruster Control Unit), FEM(Finite Element Method) is adapted. The analytical result of FEM is verified by experimental method.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.10-16
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• 2012

A computational analysis of nozzle flow characteristics and plume structure is conducted to examine performance of the supersonic nozzle employed in a thruster for ground firing test. At first, flow simulations in two-dimensional converging-diverging nozzle are performed for the verification of computational capability as well as turbulence model validity. Axisymmetric converging-diverging nozzles for ground firing test are analyzed with the k-${\omega}$ SST model. A performance penalty caused by flow separation in a diverging section is observed in initially-designed nozzle. The performance could be enhanced by the modification of the diverging section of nozzle contour.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers Conference
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• 2005.11a
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• pp.132-135
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• 2005

The computational fluid dynamic analysis has been conducted for the thermo-chemical flow field in an arcjet thruster with mono-propellant hydrazine $(N_2H_4)$ as a working fluid. Coupled Reynolds Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) equations and Maxwell equations were used to account for the Ohm heating and Lorentz forces. ionization and thermal radiation effects were also incorporated to the fluid dynamic equations by assuming infinitely-fast reactions and optically thick media. In addition to the thermo-physical understandings of the flow field inside the arcjet thruster, results shows that performance indices are improved by amount of 20% in thrust and 70% in specific impulse with the 0.6kW are heating.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers
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• v.14 no.6
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• pp.103-120
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• 2010

A development history of the thrusters used for space-vehicle orbit maneuver/attitude control is reviewed with their performance characteristics. Especially, a scrutiny is made for the current and practical application of TVC/Gimbal/Thrusters to the roll/pitch/yaw-axis control of each stage of launch vehicles. It is well perceived that a precise 3-axis attitude control system (ACS) must be equipped on the final stage of space launch vehicles (SLV) for an attainment of orbit-insertion accuracy. Under the superior reliability as well as moderate performance features, the monopropellant hydrazine thrusters occupy most of the SLV's 3-axis ACS currently operated. Domestic development status of the medium-thrust-level thruster is shortly introduced, finally.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers Conference
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• 2011.04a
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• pp.85-88
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• 2011

In the trend of world wide environment preservation, researchers tried to find new environment friendly propellant instead of highly toxic propellant, Hydrazine. Among the candidates, ionic liquid propellants have lower toxicity, higher density, and higher specific impulse than Hydrazine. These ionic liquid propellants have high combustion chamber temperature, so catalyst supports such as gamma alumina cannot withstand in that temperature. Therefore, a catalyst that showed stable characteristic in high temperature is needed. Barium dopped alumina can be changed to Hexaaluminate in high temperature, and its characteristic in high temperature is superior than gamma alumina. Barium dopped Alumina is wet impregnated with Platinum and heated up to $1300^{\circ}C$ and $1400^{\circ}C$ for 2 hours. Those catalysts were examined by XRD, SEM, EDS, BET, and Drop test.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2001.06e
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• pp.288-293
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• 2001

This paper presents the water-hammer effect due to the rapid opening and closing of isolation valve and thruster valve in the spacecraft propulsion system. The single propellant feed system was modeled to investigate the maximum peak pressure due to the water-hammer effect. The test parameters are tank supply pressure, shape and throat length of orifice and line length. Kerosene was used as the inert simulant propellant liquid instead of hydrazine. As downstream line length after isolation valve increased from 1.5 to 2.5m, the maximum line-filling water-hammer peak pressure decreased, but the average time interval between peak pressures increased. The maximum line-filling water-hammer peak pressure with orifice was lower than without orifice, and the maximum line-filling water-hammer peak pressure with orifice at the back of isolation valve was lower than with orifice in front of isolation valve. Without orifice, the maximum water-hammer peak pressure due to the rapid opening and closing of the thruster valve was about 126% of tank supply pressure. With orifice, it decreased. As orifice throat length increased, it decreased. The maximum water-hammer peak pressure due to the rapid closing of the thruster valve with converging-diverging orifice was lower than normal orifice. It was found that the orifice as a means of pressure drop was very effective to reduce the water hammer peak pressure at the thruster valve. The results of this study can be used for the design of spacecraft liquid propulsion feed system.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers Conference
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• 2011.04a
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• pp.179-182
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• 2011

A practical application of flight-axes/attitude control thrusters to the space launch vehicle and their design development localization are investigated and analyzed. Hydrazine thrusters are mostly used in a final stage of space launch vehicles on account of its higher specific impulse and reliability necessary for the precise attitude control attaining the orbit insertion with higher accuracy.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers B
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• v.27 no.10
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• pp.1377-1384
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• 2003

An analysis has been performed for active thermal control of the KOMPSAT monopropellant rocket engine assembly, i.e., dual thruster module(DTM). The main efforts of this work have been directed at determining proper heater sizes for propellant valves and catalyst beds necessary to maintain their temperatures within specified temperature ranges under KOMPSAT environment and operational conditions. The TAS incorporated with TRASYS thermal radiation analyzer was used to establish a complete heat transfer model which allows to predict the DTM temperature as a function of time. The thermal analysis has been performed in transient mode to verify the appropriate power for catalyst bed heaters necessary to increase catalyst bed temperature to the required value within a specified period of time. Similar analysis has been executed to validate the heater power for the thermostatically controlled primary and redundant heater circuits used to prevent hydrazine freezing, i.e., single fault. Moreover the effect of the radiative property of thermal control coating of heat shield was examined. Thruster firing condition was also simulated for the heat soakback condition. As a consequence, all thermal analysis results for DTM satisfactorily met the thermal requirements for the KOMPSAT DTM under the worst case average voltage, i.e. 25 volt.