As the first part of an ongoing study on heat flux and abation on hypersonic vehicles, a material response implicit solver with solid ablation and pyrolysis is developed. As a first step, code-to-code validations and comparisons with experimental data are performed. A study of the various effects of pyrolysis gas within an ablator is also performed; using realistic re-entry conditions on a gene...

Forewords Computational Fluid Dynamic is becoming a mature discipline in aerospace sciences. It is no longer only an analysis tool but ready to be used in all stages of design as well. The materials here presented review the growth and advances done in the last 10 years for hypersonic flow phenomena in continuum regime. The status of the physical modelling, code development issues such as algor...

Lockheed Martin Skunk Works, under a cooperative agreement with NASA, will build and fly the X-33, a half-scale prototype of a rocket-based, single-stage-to-orbit (SSTO), reusable launch vehicle (RLV). A 0.007-scale model of the X-33 604B0002G configuration was tested in four hypersonic facilities at the NASA Langley Research Center to examine vehicle stability and control characteristics and t...

The N, N2 system is studied to yield rate coefficients and cross sections for molecular dissociation under conditions important for assessing nonequilibrium heating of hypersonic vehicles. First principle calculations are used to generate realistic nuclear interaction potentials, and these are used with accurate molecular dynamics to yield the fundamental data required for a rigorous treatment ...

This paper summarizes the current efforts at VKI and collaborating institutions in understanding nonequilibrium phenomena in hypersonic flows. Research activities related to “Detailed gas chemistry models,” “Kinetic theory,” and “Rarefied gas effects” are described. Keywords— Atmospheric entry flows, Thermo-chemical nonequilibrium flows, Computational Fluid Dynamics.