• Journal of the Society of Naval Architects of Korea
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• v.52 no.1
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• pp.34-42
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• 2015

The development of an azimuth thruster which has the function of dynamic positioning and propulsion has been greatly required as the demand of vehicles with it increases. To develop or design a reliable azimuth thruster, it is appropriate that the performance and cavitation observation tests should be conducted in the regime of high Reynolds number. In the present study, to satisfy high Reynolds number condition new dynamometer for a large azimuth thruster is manufactured and arranged in the test section of the Large Cavitation Tunnel (LCT). The test method composed of the open water and the cavitation observation tests is established successfully in LCT, considering the thruster design.

• Journal of Ocean Engineering and Technology
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• v.36 no.6
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• pp.353-363
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• 2022

The azimuth thruster is mainly installed on a vessel that requires a dynamic positioning (DP) function for special purposes. When the azimuth thruster on a vessel operates for DP, the thrust loss is induced by the thruster-hull interaction. This study examined the influence of boundary conditions in numerical simulations for predicting thrust loss. Wind turbine installation vessels (WTIV) and floating production storage and offloading (FPSO) were chosen as a target vessels. In this study, two types of boundaries were defined. The first consideration is that the boundary condition was assigned with consideration of the azimuth angle of the thruster, whereas it is fixed regardless azimuth angle of the thruster. The predicted thrust loss according to these boundary conditions showed a difference. This observation originated from the current load of the vessel. Therefore, the boundary conditions for which the current load is not induced need to be designated to obtain a realistic thrust loss in a numerical simulation.

• Aerospace Engineering and Technology
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.14-21
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• 2010

Ion thruster is a kind of electrostatic thruster that use electrostatic field in order to accelerate ionized propellant. Ion thruster have characteristics of small thrust but very high specific impulse among the electric thrusters. High specific impulse can reduce propellant consumption significantly. So, ion thruster have advantage for long time and long distance mission. Recently, plans for space exploration is increasing gradually not only at traditional forward countries for space like USA, Russia and Europe, but also other countries like Japan, China and India. Exploration for superior planets and asteroids the propellant ratio can go up to about 99% when chemical propulsion is used as a cruising thruster. Therefore, latest space exploration vehicles use the ion thruster as main thruster for del-V burn and use monopropellant thrusters for attitude control. In this paper, the development process of preliminary ECR ion thruster and the ECR discharge test results will be presented.

• Journal of Advanced Research in Ocean Engineering
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• v.3 no.3
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• pp.102-111
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• 2017

This study considered the effects on the seabed of a harbor and quay wall from ship maneuvers in relation to the thruster jet flow and initial velocity. This study also included the engine capacity, RPM, and diameter and pitch of a ship's thruster for a required speed. The impact of a scour hole on the environment of a quay wall was investigated. Based on these results, a risk based analysis was conducted to evaluate different strategies and their consequences. There has been an increase in the loads on the bottom of a harbor during ship maneuvering. This increase is caused by the propeller loads of mooring and unmooring vessels. This indicates a greater number of arrivals and departures of vessels with larger drafts, larger thruster diameters, and larger available thruster power capacities. Another important cause could be an increase in the maneuverability of vessels from the use of bow thrusters. The increasing loads, which cause a higher jet flow above the bottom, can lead to undesirable scour holes.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers Conference
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• 2011.11a
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• pp.254-257
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• 2011

Two types of thrusters(Descent Control Thruster (DCT) for reducing landing speed and Attitude Control Thruster (ACT) for attitude control) are mounted on the propulsion system of Ground test model lunar lander. In this paper, plume impingement effect and ground effect between DCT Modules are analyzed using numerical method when the impact occurred close to the ground.

• Ocean Systems Engineering
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• v.1 no.4
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• pp.297-315
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• 2011

New applications of streamlined Autonomous Underwater Vehicles require an AUV capable of completing missions with both high-speed straight-line runs and slow maneuvers or station keeping tasks. At low, or zero, forward speeds, the AUV's control surfaces become ineffective. To improve an AUV's low speed maneuverability, while maintaining a low drag profile, through-body tunnel thrusters have become a popular addition to modern AUV systems. The effect of forward vehicle motion and sideslip on these types of thrusters is not well understood. In order to characterize these effects and to adapt existing tunnel thruster models to include them, an experimental system was constructed. This system includes a transverse tunnel thruster mounted in a streamlined AUV. A 6-axis load cell mounted internally was used to measure the thrust directly. The AUV was mounted in Memorial University of Newfoundland's tow tank, and several tests were run to characterize the effect of vehicle motion on the transient and steady state thruster performance. Finally, a thruster model was modified to include these effects.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2003.04a
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• pp.468-472
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• 2003

MRE-1 dual thruster module(DTM) which will be installed to the present under development KOMPSAT(Korea Multi-Purpose Satellite) can provide reliable and cost-effective means of propulsive control for attitude and maneuvering control system. Thruster heat shield, one of the main components of DTM, is designed to intercept the radiative heat exchange between thruster and satellite during firing. The inside diameter of the current configuration will be decreased a little compared with that of the previous one due to manufacturing method change. Therefore, the possibility of interference between thruster and heat shield due to configuration change is investigated through structural analysis and their results are described in this paper.

• 한국전산유체공학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2004.10a
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• pp.137-139
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• 2004

The monopropellant hydrazine thrusters are widely used for the satellite on-board propulsion system fulfilling various missions in space. They have outstanding features caused by the nearly unlimited restart capability and the very high credibility. The sole monopropellant thruster used at precent in nation is MRE-1 that is a standard component of NASA. It can produce 4.45 N of nominal thrust. Due to the glowing complexity with a satellite mission, the needs for thrusters of the diverse performance are being increased. The numerical simulation could give useful information to develop a new type thruster instead of the experiments performed previously. Therefore it is critical to make a reliable computer code to prepare design change of a thruster. In this paper, the performance analysis and validation of the satellite monopropellant hydrazine thruster currently used is accomplished as the preliminary study to serve valuable data for future design change.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers Conference
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• 2004.03a
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• pp.262-270
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• 2004

Basic experiments were carried out using the THT-IV low-power Hall thruster to examine the influences of magnetic field shape and strength, and acceleration channel length on thruster performance and to establish guidelines for design of high-performance Hall thrusters. Thrusts were measured with varying magnetic field and channel structure. Exhaust plasma diagnostic measurement was also made to evaluate plume divergent angles and voltage utilization efficiencies. Ion current spatial profiles were measured with a Faraday cup, and ion energy distribution functions were estimated from data with a retarding potential analyzer. The thruster was stably operated with a highest performance under an optimum acceleration channel length of 20 mm and an optimum magnetic field with a maximum strength of about 150 Gauss near the channel exit and with some shape considering ion acceleration directions. Accordingly, an optimum magnetic field and channel structure is considered to exist under an operational condition, related to inner physical phenomena of plasma production, ion acceleration and exhaust plasma feature. A new Hall thruster was designed with basic research data of the THT-IV thruster. With the thruster with many considerations, long stable operations were achieved. In all experiments at 200-400 V with 1.5-3 mg/s, the thrust and the specific impulse ranged from 15 to 70 mN and from 1100 to 2300 see, respectively, in a low electric power range of 300~1300 W. The thrust efficiency reached 55 %. Hence, a large map of the thruster performance was successfully made. The thermal characteristics were also examined with data of both measured and calculated temperatures in the thruster body. Thermally safe conditions were achieved with all input powers.

• International Journal of Naval Architecture and Ocean Engineering
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• v.7 no.6
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• pp.1044-1055
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• 2015

DPCap analysis can assist in determining the maximum environmental forces the DP system can counteract for a given heading. DPCap analysis results are highly affected by the thrust forces provided by the thrust system which consists of several kinds of thrusters. The thrust forces and moment are determined by the maximum thrust of the thrusters as well as the thruster configuration. In this paper, a novel local optimization of thruster configuration based on a synthesized positioning capability criterion is proposed. The combination of the discrete locations of the thrusters forms the thruster configuration and is the input, and the synthesized positioning capability is the output. The quantified synthesized positioning capability of the corresponding thruster configuration can be generated as the output. The optimal thruster configuration is the one which makes the vessel has the best positioning capability. A software program was developed based on the present study. A local optimization of thruster configuration for a supply vessel was performed to demonstrate the effectiveness and efficiency of the program. Even though the program cannot find the global optimal thruster configuration, its high efficiency makes it essentially practical in an engineering point. It may be used as a marine research tool and give guidance to the designer of the thrust system.