COMPARISON OF COUPLED RADIATIVE FLOW SOLUTIONS WITH PROJECT FIRE-II FLIGHT DATA

A nonequilibrium, axisymmetric, Navier-Stokes flow solver with coupled radiation has been developed for use in the design of thermal protect ion systems for vehicles where radiation effects are important. The pr esent method has been compared with an existing flow and radiation sol ver and with the Project Fire II experimental data. Good agreement has been obtained over the entire Fire II trajectory with the experimenta lly determined values of the stagnation radiation intensity in the 0.2 -6.2 eV range and with the total stagnation heating. The effects of a number of flow models are examined to determine which combination of p hysical models produces the best agreement with the experimental data. These models include radiation coupling, multitemperature thermal mod els, and finite rate chemistry. Finally, the computational efficiency of the present model is evaluated. The radiation properties model deve loped for this study is shown to offer significant computational savin gs compared to existing codes.