Numerical simulation of transpiration cooling with a two-dimensional substructure

Conference item

This paper presents a numerical model which assesses the coupled effect when transpiration cooling is applied to the external skin of a thermal protection system and the substructure of a high speed flight vehicle. The PIRATE transpiration cooling code has been extended and validated to account for quasi-two-dimensional lateral conduction effects allowing for analysis of more complex geometries. This enables very fast calculations of the two dimensional transient temperature response of a transpiration cooled thermal protection system, ideally suitable for large scale systems studies. To solve for the coupled transpiration cooled material and two-dimensional substructure, PIRATE has been coupled with the commercial finite element package COMSOL. This enables modelling of the longer term thermal effects of the integrated heat load over a flight trajectory. Transpiration cooling has been applied to a simplified blunt body model with an aluminium substructure. Results for the substructure temperature history for the Space Shuttle trajectory are obtained showing that transpiration cooling can lead to a 40% reduction in peak substructure temperature as well as a reduction in thermal stresses near the stagnation point.

Authors: Naved, I; McGilvray, M; Hermann, T

• Publication status: Accepted
• Peer review status: Peer reviewed
• Publisher: ESA Conference Bureau
• Host title: International Conference on Flight vehicles, Aerothermodynamics and Re-entry Missions and Engineering
• Acceptance date: 2019-09-16
• Event title: International Conference on Flight vehicles, Aerothermodynamics and Re-entry Missions and Engineering
• Event location: Monopoli, Italy
• Event website: https://atpi.eventsair.com/QuickEventWebsitePortal/far2019/website
• Event start date: 2019-09-30
• Event end date: 2019-10-03
• Language: English
• Keywords: FFR