• Journal of Aerospace System Engineering
• /
• v.14 no.4
• /
• pp.1-9
• /
• 2020

The characteristics of an aerospike pintle nozzle system with excellent altitude compensation were analyzed using cold air testing. It was confirmed that reducing the stroke of the aerospike nozzle is effective in increasing the thrust. However, the results of additional numerical analysis indicated that the discharge coefficient factor was significantly lower at the maximum stroke. The Vena contracta due to the cowl reduction angle decreased the effective nozzle throat area at the maximum stroke and hindered expansion. Complementing the cowl design may thus increase the efficiency of a solid-propellant rocket engine that uses the aerospike pintle nozzle system.

• 한국가시화정보학회:학술대회논문집
• /
• 2004.12a
• /
• pp.75-80
• /
• 2004

Aerospike nozzles have been expected to be used for an engine of a reusable space shuttle to respond to growing demand for rocket-launching and its cost reduction. In this study, the flow field structures in any cross sections around clustered linear aerospike nozzles are visualized and analyzed, using laser induced fluorescence (LIF) of nitrogen monoxide seeded in the carrier gas of nitrogen. Since flow field structures are affected mainly by pressure ratio, the clustered linear aerospike nozzle is set inside a vacuum chamber to carry out the experiments in the wide range of pressure ratios from 75 to 200. Flow fields are visualized in several cross-sections, demonstrating the complicated three-dimensional flow field structures. Pressure sensitive paint (PSP) of PtTFPP bound by poly- IBM -co-TFEM is also applied to measurement of the complicated pressure distribution on the spike surface, and to verification of contribution of a truncation plane to the thrust. Finally, to examine the effect of the sidewalls attached to the aerospike nozzle, the flow fields around the nozzle with the sidewalls are compared with those without sidewalls.

• Advances in aircraft and spacecraft science
• /
• v.6 no.3
• /
• pp.225-238
• /
• 2019

A spike attached to a blunt nosed body significantly alters its flow field and influences the aerodynamic coefficients at hypersonic speed. The basic body is an axisymmetric, with a hemisphere nose followed by a cylindrical portion. Five different types of spikes, namely, conical aerospike, hemisphere aerospike, flat-face aerospike, hemisphere aerodisk and flat-face aerodisk are attached to the basic body in order to assess the aerodynamic characteristic. The spiked blunt body without the aerospike or aerodisk has been set to be a basic model. The coefficients of drag, lift and pitching moment were measured with and without blunt spike body for the length-to-diameter ratio (L/D) of 0.5, 1.0, 1.5 and 2.0, at Mach 6 and angle of attack up to 8 degrees using a strain gauge balance. The measured forces and moment data are employed to determine the relative performance of the aerodynamic with respect to the basic model. A maximum of 77 percent drag reduction was achieved with hemisphere aerospike of L/D = 2.0. The comparison of aerodynamic coefficients between the basic model and the spiked blunt body reveals that the aerodynamic drag and pitching moment coefficients decrease with increasing the L/D ratio and angle of attack but the lift coefficient has increasing characteristics.

• Advances in aircraft and spacecraft science
• /
• v.7 no.4
• /
• pp.371-385
• /
• 2020

A forward-facing aerospike attached to a payload fairing of a satellite launch vehicle significantly alters its flowfield and decreases the aerodynamic drag in transonic and low supersonic speeds. The present payload fairing is an axisymmetric configuration and consists of a blunt-nosed body along with a conical section, payload shroud, boat tail and followed by a booster. The main purpose of the present numerical simulations is to evaluate flowfield and assess the performance of aerodynamic drag coefficient with and without aerospike attached to a payload fairing of a typical satellite launch vehicle in freestream Mach number range 0.8 ≤ M_∞ ≤ 3.0 and freestream Reynolds number range 33.35 × 10⁶/m ≤ Re_∞ ≤ 46.75 × 10⁶/m whichincludes the maximum aerodynamic drag and maximum dynamic conditions during ascent flight trajectory of the satellite launch vehicle. A numerical simulation has been carried out to solve time-dependent compressible turbulent axisymmetric Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes equations. The closure of the system of equations is achieved using the Baldwin-Lomax turbulence model. The aerodynamic drag reduction mechanism is analysed employing numerical results such as velocity vector plots, density and Mach contours in conjunction with the experimental flow visualization pictures. The variations of wall pressure coefficient over the payload fairing with and without aerospike are exhibiting different kind of flowfield characteristics in the transonic and low supersonic speeds. The numerically computed results are compared with schlieren pictures, oil flow patterns and measured wall pressure distributions and exhibit good agreement between them.

• Journal of Aerospace System Engineering
• /
• v.16 no.4
• /
• pp.1-9
• /
• 2022

A design factor analysis was conducted to reduce the thrust reduction in the off-design, due to the driving of the aerospike pintle nozzle. The close (NPR 100) as well as the open (NPR 11) stroke were fixed, as under-expansion conditions. The pintle contour, pintle head radius (R), cowl angle (θ), and cowl exit length (L) were selected as design factors. The change in thrust was analyzed, using a verified numerical analysis technique. First, the pintle head radius and the length of the cowl exit had little influence on the thrust. The cowl angle changed the mass flow rate by affecting the effective nozzle throat area, and created a reverse pressure gradient at the cowl exit. As a result of applying the dual aerospike contour, it was confirmed that the thrust in the design-off increased by approximately 1.2%, compared to the reference case and by approximately 3.4% compared to the worst case.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers Conference
• /
• 2010.11a
• /
• pp.616-617
• /
• 2010

Nemerical analysis was carried out for a patented SNECMA modulatable thrust device. By adopting aerospike-like nozzle and a moving needle, proposed modulatable thrust device are capable of delivering optimal thrust according to the altitude.

• 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.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers Conference
• /
• 2004.10a
• /
• pp.43-46
• /
• 2004

This work is experimental study about a nozzle part in the aerodynamic igniter using only compressible gas. In study, constructions of the aerodynamic igniter using a supersonic nozzle and an aerospike nozzle have been introduced, and experimental results(mainly max. heating temperature characteristics) have been presented. Using of the supersonic nozzle leads to faster and higher temperature in same mass flow, and the aerospike nozzle works in wide variable range of pressure.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers Conference
• /
• 2004.03a
• /
• pp.408-413
• /
• 2004

Numerical and experimental investigation were car-ried out to clarify the flow structure of underexpanded jet from a square nozzle. The square nozzle rep-resents one of the clustered combustors of a linear aerospike engine. From the numerical results, the three-dimensional shock wave of the underexpanded square jet was found to be composed of two shocks. One is the intercepting shock which corresponds to the shock observed in two-dimensional planar jet. The other is the recompression shock divided into two types. The expansion fans coming from the nozzle edges interact with each other at the comers of the nozzle exit, and overexpanded regions are generated. Therefore one of the two recompression shocks is formed at the comers of the nozzle exit behind the overexpanded regions. As the jet goes downstream, the overexpanded regions grow larger to coalesce at the symmetry planes. Then, the other type of the recompression shock is generated. The three-dimensional shock structure formed by the intercepting shock and the recompression shocks dominates the expansion of the jet boundary. The shock detection algorithm us-ing CFD results was developed to reveal the relation between the shock waves and the jet boundary, and it was found that the cross-sectional jet shape becomes cross-shape. The key features observed in the numerical investigation were verified by the experimental results. The shock structure at the diagonal plane was in good agreement with the experimental schlieren images. Moreover, the cross-sections visualized by the Mie scattering method confirmed that the cross-section of the jet becomes cross-shape.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers
• /
• v.23 no.3
• /
• pp.28-34
• /
• 2019

The thrust control calculation according to the operation of plug nozzle for cold air test and the analysis of the flow characteristics of the pintle shape and operation pressure are performed. The numerical computation was verified by comparing the flow structure and the coefficient of thrust with the experimental data. It was confirmed that the nozzle throat was formed at the design position on each pintle shape, and thrust control up to 1:8 was achieved only by the stroke change. Finally, although the aerospike nozzle is autonomous, it is unfavorable in the under_expansion condition, if it is designed for a very low nozzle pressure ratio.