Experimental Investigation of Heat Transfer in a Subscale Liquid Rocket Engine

Abstract

This work presents the experimental investigation of heat fluxes through the walls of a reduced-scale rocket motor using hydrogen and oxygen as propellants. The engine is watercooled so that it can be run in steady state for up to 120 s. More than 100 thermocouples are used to retrieve wall temperature and derive heat fluxes. It is shown how the chamber pressure affects the overall heat-flux level, while the mixture ratio greatly influences its distribution. Direct visualisation of the flame provides an indication that the heat-flux distribution is correlated to the location of heat release given by OH* visualization.

A Review on Advancements and Characteristics of Cryogenic Propulsion Rocket Engine

“…i.e. the oxygen combustion produces extremely high temperatures and pressure in the thrust chamber and these high thermodynamic circumstances combined with diffusion flames burning near stoichiometric ratio can result in concentrations of burned gases exceeding this 3500 K range 59) . When such hot concentrations approach the combustion chamber walls, intense heat fluxes and extremely high temperatures occur, which may transcend the material's thermal resistance.…”