Ew. Messerchmid et al., NUMERICAL MODELING OF PLASMA WIND-TUNNEL FLOWS, Zeitschrift fur Flugwissenschaften und Weltraumforschung, 19(3), 1995, pp. 158-165
In the frame of the Sonderforschungsbereich 259 plasma wind tunnel fac
ilities are employed to test candidate materials for thermal protectio
n systems. To obtain the necessary understanding of the flow phenomena
within these facilities, a variety of experimental diagnostic tools i
s used and a CFD code system is developed. First investigations were m
ade using nitrogen as flow medium in the plasma wind tunnel. The opera
tion parameters were chosen to represent the stagnation region paramet
ers as encountered at the wing leading edge of a HERMES type reentry v
ehicle at the peak heating trajectory point. Using these experimental
results for a free jet in the facility, the code system was validated.
Therefore, finite rate chemistry, thermal non-equilibrium effects and
turbulence effects were investigated, all of these being implemented
in the code system. The results were compared to a straightforward the
ory for turbulent free jets with good agreement. Thus, a simple and fa
st prediction procedure and a more accurate CFD code system to compute
the fine structure of the plasma wind tunnel flow-field were develope
d. The basic features of these methods, the results obtained for a nit
rogen jet and the comparison to experimental data are presented here.