research
Aero-Heating of Shallow Cavities in Hypersonic Freestream Flow
- Publication date
- Publisher
Abstract
The purpose of these experiments and analysis was to augment the heating database and tools used for assessment of impact-induced shallow-cavity damage to the thermal protection system of the Space Shuttle Orbiter. The effect of length and depth on the local heating disturbance of rectangular cavities tested at hypersonic freestream conditions has been globally assessed using the two-color phosphor thermography method. These rapid-response experiments were conducted in the Langley 31-Inch Mach 10 Tunnel and were initiated immediately prior to the launch of STS-114, the initial flight in the Space Shuttle Return-To-Flight Program, and continued during the first week of the mission. Previously-designed and numerically-characterized blunted-nose baseline flat plates were used as the test surfaces. Three-dimensional computational predictions of the entire model geometry were used as a check on the design process and the two-dimensional flow assumptions used for the data analysis. The experimental boundary layer state conditions were inferred using the measured heating distributions on a no-cavity test article. Two test plates were developed, each containing 4 equally-spaced spanwise-distributed cavities. The first test plate contained cavities with a constant length-to-depth ratio of 8 with design point depth-to-boundary-layer-thickness ratios of 0.1, 0.2, 0.35, and 0.5. The second test plate contained cavities with a constant design point depth-to-boundary-layer-thickness ratio of 0.35 with length-to-depth ratios of 8, 12, 16, and 20. Cavity design parameters and the test condition matrix were established using the computational predictions. Preliminary results indicate that the floor-averaged Bump Factor (local heating rate nondimensionalized by upstream reference) at the tested conditions is approximately 0.3 with a standard deviation of 0.04 for laminar-in/laminar-out conditions when the cavity length-to-boundary-layer thickness is between 2.5 and 10 and for cavities in the depth-to-boundary-layer-thickness range of 0.3 to 0.8. Over this same range of conditions and parameters, preliminary results also indicate that the maximum Bump Factor on the cavity centerline falls between 2.0 and 2.75, as long as the cavity-exit conditions remain laminar. Cavities with length-to-boundary-layer-thickness ratio less than 2.5 can not be easily classified with this approach and require further analysis