Accession Number:

ADA399738

Title:

Modelling of Composite-Propellant Flames

Descriptive Note:

Final rept. 1 Jul 1997-30 Jun 2001

Corporate Author:

ILLINOIS UNIV AT URBANA DEPT OF AERONAUTICAL AND ASTRONAUTICAL ENGINEERING

Personal Author(s):

• Buckmaster, J.

Report Date:

2001-06-01

Pagination or Media Count:

4.0

Abstract:

We examined small deviations from axial symmetry in a solid-propellant rocket motor, and describe a bath-tub-vortex effect, in which substantial axial vorticity is generated in a neighborhood of the chamber centerline. The unperturbed flow field is essentially inviscid at modest Reynolds numbers, even at the chamber walls, as has long been known, but the inviscid perturbed flow is singular at the centerline, and viscous terms are required to regularize it. We examine perturbations sufficiently small that a linear analysis is valid everywhere and larger perturbations in which a nonlinear patch is created near the centerline of radius. Our results provide and explanation of swirl experimentally observed by others, and a cautionary note for those concerned with numerical simulations of these flows, whether laminar or turbulent.

Descriptors:

• *FLOW FIELDS
• *SOLID PROPELLANT ROCKET ENGINES
• VORTICES
• INVISCID FLOW
• REYNOLDS NUMBER
• AXIAL FLOW

Subject Categories:

• Fluid Mechanics
• Solid Propellant Rocket Engines

Distribution Statement:

APPROVED FOR PUBLIC RELEASE