THEORY OF PLUME RADIANCE FROM THE BOW SHOCK ULTRAVIOLET-2 ROCKET FLIGHT

A computational fluid dynamics algorithm is used to simulate the flowf ield and solid rocket motor plume about the bow shock ultraviolet 2 fl ight vehicle. A new computationally efficient algorithm to model two-p hase gas and particulate flow is developed. The flow over the complete rocket geometry and its interaction with the particle-laden plume is simulated. The computed plume radiance is compared with radiometric an d spectroscopic data and good agreement with radiance magnitudes and s pectral characteristics is obtained for the intrinsic core rocket exha ust data. The computation underpredicts the observed signal from the f ar-field photometers by many orders of magnitude. Based on the particu late flow simulations developed here and new experimental data, we hyp othesize that the far-field radiation is due to molecular emission. Us e of the CO Cameron band spectra obtained on this flight provides an e stimate of the governing temperature of such radiation.