A numerical study is performed which focuses on peak temperatures experienced by a liquid monopropellant during high-speed injection in a small-diameter nozzle. Attention is focused on short-duration injection during which the nozzle wall boundary layer is predominantly laminar. An unsteady ID analysis of the temperature distribution associated with sudden fluid acceleration over a flat insulated boundary is first conducted. Expressions are provided which relate the normalized peak wall temperature to the prevailing Eckert and Prandtl numbers. Results reveal a quadratic dependence of the normalized wall temperature on impulse velocity, and a nonlinear variation with Prandtl number. Next, simulation of high-speed flow in an axisymmetric nozzle is performed. The numerical schemes are based on finite-difference discretization of a vorticity-based formulation of the mass, momentum, and energy conservation equations. Implementation of the numerical schemes to flow of LP 1846 in a 4 mm diameter nozzle indicates that preignition is likely to occur for velocities higher than 200 m/s. The effects of wall heat transfer and temperature-dependent properties are also discussed.

Issue Section:
Forced Convection
Keywords:
Conduction, Numerical Methods, Transient and Unsteady Heat Transfer
Topics:
Flow (Dynamics), Heat transfer, Heating, Nozzles, Shear (Mechanics), Temperature, Wall temperature, Boundary layers, Energy conservation, Fluids, Heat conduction, Impulse (Physics), Momentum, Numerical analysis, Prandtl number, Simulation, Temperature distribution, Transients (Dynamics), Vorticity
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