HIFiRE-1 Boundary-Layer Transition: Ground Test Results and Stability Analysis

The HIFiRE-1 is a 7-degree half-angle circular cone with a 2.5-mm nose radius. A successful HIFiRE-1 flight experiment was carried out in March 2010. Due to an anomaly in the exoatmospheric pointing maneuver, the reentry angle of attack was higher than anticipated (5–15 degrees instead of near zero). A test campaign in the H2K hypersonic wind tunnel at DLR Cologne gathered high-frequency pressure fluctuation data and global heat flux via infrared (IR) thermography at the high angles of attack and Reynolds numbers encountered in the as-flown trajectory. This paper presents analysis of data collected at 0° angle of attack at freestream Reynolds numbers from 5.7 to 10.7e6 /m for 1.6- and 2.5-mm-radius nosetips. The transition onset and end locations derived from IR thermography coincide well with the earliest and largest amplification of pressure fluctuations identified by the fast-response surface-mounted pressure transducers. Stability analysis of the astested conditions was done with the Stability and Transition of Boundary Layers (STABL) software suite. An N-factor of 5.5 correlates well with transition location for the 1.6-mm radius nosetip. For the blunter nosetip, N ≈ 5.2 at transition. The peak pressure-fluctuation frequencies predicted by STABL agree within 8% of those measured