• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers Conference
• /
• 2011.11a
• /
• pp.135-138
• /
• 2011

As a basic research for the development of Korean lunar lander, propulsion system development for ground test is in progress. Thrust for descent is 200 N class. Design target is 220 N in vacuum thrust at 100 g/s flow rate, 200 psi chamber pressure. For ground test, thrust measurement system using LM guide was developed and test was performed. The result shows 160 N thrust in atmosphere condition at 210 psi chamber pressure.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Visualization
• /
• v.10 no.1
• /
• pp.47-54
• /
• 2012

Single Stage To Orbit (SSTO) missions which require its engines to be operated at varying back pressure conditions, use engines operate at high combustion chamber pressures (more than 100bar) with moderate area ratios (AR 70~80). This ensures that the exhaust jet flows full during most part of the operational regimes by optimal expansion at each altitude. Aero-spike nozzle is a kind of altitude adaptation nozzle where requirement of high combustion chamber pressures can be avoided as the flow is adapted to the outside conditions by the virtue of the nozzle configuration. However, the thrust prediction using the conventional thrust equations remains to be a challenge as the nozzle plume shapes vary with the back pressure conditions. In the present work, the performance evaluation of a new aero-spike nozzle is being carried out. Computational studies are carried out to predict the thrust generated by the aero-spike nozzle in varying back pressure conditions which requires the unsteady pressure boundary conditions in the computational domain. Schlieren pictures are taken to validate the computational results. It is found that the flow in the aero-spike nozzle is mainly affected by the base wall pressure variation. The aerospike nozzle exhibits maximum performance in the properly expanded flow regime due to the open wake formation.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
• /
• v.42 no.2
• /
• pp.144-149
• /
• 2014

A ground firing test for hot-fire performance evaluation according to the characteristic length($L^*$) variation of thrust chamber was carried out for the hydrazine thruster which may be employed in space launch vehicles. A scrutiny into the performance characteristics of each thruster is made in terms of thrust, specific impulse, response characteristics, and characteristic velocity at steady-state firing mode with propellant inlet pressure of 2.41 MPa (350 psia). Through the test results, it has been verified that performance of characteristic velocity and specific impulse degrades as the characteristic length deviates from that of the standard model. Thus, it is confirmed that the thrust chamber configuration of standard model was suitably designed for the requirement specified.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers
• /
• v.25 no.3
• /
• pp.89-100
• /
• 2021

This paper deals with the construction of a combustion test facility and preliminary tests for hot-firing tests of a methane engine. First, the combustion test facility for a 1 kN-class thrust chamber using liquid oxygen/gas methane as propellants was designed and built. Before hot-firing tests, the cold-flow tests of each propellant line and the ignition tests of torch igniter/afterburner were performed to verify propellant supply stability of the combustion test facility, operation of the control and measurement system, and successful ignition. Finally, a preliminary hot-firing test was conducted to measure the combustion efficiency, heat flux, and combustion stability of a thrust chamber prototype. The constructed combustion test facility will be helpfully used for basic research and development of methane engine thrust chambers.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers
• /
• v.18 no.1
• /
• pp.50-57
• /
• 2014

A ground hot-firing test (HFT) was conducted to take out the optimal design configurations for the thrust chamber of 70 N-class liquid rocket engine under development. Monopropellant grade (purity: ${\geq}98.5%$) hydrazine was adopted as a propellant for the HFT, and three kinds of thrust chambers having characteristic lengths ($L^*$) of 2.79, 2.95, and 3.13 m were selected for their performance evaluation. It is revealed through the test and evaluation that the increase of the $L^*$ leads to a performance degradation in the test condition specified, and pulse response performance of the development model shows superior characteristics to commercialized hydrazine thrusters.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
• /
• v.43 no.4
• /
• pp.311-317
• /
• 2015

This paper describes how to apply one-dimensional simulation to predict unsteady state characteristics of the cold-gas pintle thruster. Mass flow rate, chamber pressure, and nozzle exit pressure are key parameters for thrust control. Chamber pressure rose and fell monotonously with the pintle stroke variation, while thrust variation was different from chamber pressure variation. During the forward pintle stroke operation, the thrust value tended to decrease initially and returned to increase when pintle speed and chamber free volume exceed some specified value. Even though one-dimensional simulation has the limitations to predict unsteady state characteristics, it is still useful for initial performance assessment of various thrusters which adopt an altitude compensation nozzle such as a dual-bell nozzle, prior to experiment or numerical analysis.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
• /
• v.37 no.11
• /
• pp.1096-1103
• /
• 2009

The predictions of the material behavior for the structural stability of thrust chamber mixing head at very-low temperatures are very important since the head is highly pressurized by the liquid oxygen with very-low temperatures and experiences impact load by the thrust of combustion chamber. The constitutive equation to express tensile deformation behavior of the material at very-low temperature to predict deformation behavior of the mixing head is formulated by composition of thermal component and athermal component based on dislocation energy barrier model suggested by Kocks. Also, increase of thermal stress components by the increase of obstacles at low temperatures is formulated to the equation similar with Ramberg-Osgood equation. The suggested model predicted well the material's behavior at the wide temperature ranges from very-low temperature to ambient temperature.

• Journal of ILASS-Korea
• /
• v.23 no.4
• /
• pp.159-168
• /
• 2018

Thrust throttling in a liquid rocket engine can be implemented via several ways such as high pressure drop injector, dual manifold, multiple chamber, pintle injector, and gas injection. Thrust throttling using gas injection controls thrust by usually injecting inert gas into propellant through an aerator to reduce the propellant's bulk density. In this study, the outside-in aerator was used in the propellant line to create two phase flow. Closed-type, open-type, and screw-type bi-swirl coaxial injectors were utilized for investigating throttling characteristics such as pressure drop, mixture density, and discharge coefficient according to gas-liquid mass ratio.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers Conference
• /
• 2008.11a
• /
• pp.89-93
• /
• 2008

The effect of pintle shapes and position to the thrust performance of Solid Rocket Motor was studied by experimental-aided Computational Fluid Dynamic(CFD). Among the turbulent models for RANS in Fluent, Spalart-Allmaras model was better agreement with the nozzle wall pressure distribution attained by cold-flow test than other models. When nozzle throat area was decreased, magnitude of thrust was increased. The bigger pintle size was, the more thrust of pintle tip pressure was obtained. Meanwhile the more thrust of nozzle and chamber pressure decreased. Hence, total thrust of big pintle was less than a small pintle under same throat area condition.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers Conference
• /
• 2012.05a
• /
• pp.110-116
• /
• 2012

To analyze flow characteristics and performance of the side jet thruster with 4 shutters and rectangular nozzles, a 3-D simulation has been implemented. Numerical calculations for three rotation anlgles of the shutter, have been conducted. Internal recirculation in a chamber and asymmetric flow structure in a nozzle were observed. In addition, the more shutter rotated, the more asymmetries of flow increased, and this phenomena resulted in thrust bias. The degrees of thrust bias and thrust performance with the rotation angles of the shutter were predicted and comparisons with theoretical thrust were made.