Date of Award

Fall 2009

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Department

Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering

Program/Concentration

Aerospace Engineering

Committee Director

Robert L. Ash

Committee Member

Colin Britcher

Committee Member

Drew Landman

Call Number for Print

Special Collections; LD4331.E535 B53 2009

Abstract

This work focuses on the development of a reusable rocket nozzle unit for near-term Mars surface applications, utilizing Mars atmosphere as a propellant source. Mars atmosphere is more than 95% carbon dioxide, and its low ambient temperatures facilitate the condensation of dry ice out of the atmosphere. Furthermore, the low critical temperature of carbon dioxide enables . the production of a supercritical fluid by heating dry ice at constant volume to temperatures on the order of 400 K. The goal of this research was to develop a supersonic nozzle for reusable high-thrust propulsion. Due to the complex behavior of supercritical carbon dioxide gas, it was not possible to employ a linear method of characteristics using a perfect-gas-based, Prandtl-Meyer function, thus necessitating the development of a real-gas-based method of characteristics for isentropic axisymmetric flow. The resulting streamline contour predictions for the supersonic nozzle section required boundary layer displacement thickness adjustments in order to guide the actual nozzle construction. Boundary layer corrections for a Mach 2 nozzle design have been discussed and were incorporated in the resulting overall nozzle contour specifications.

Supercritical carbon dioxide propulsion performance testing was confined to measuring the thrust and specific impulse produced by a 1 mm diameter sonic nozzle. The tests showed that these systems can produce specific impulse levels that exceed 100 seconds for short durations, and that useful thrust augmentation can be produced by heating the expanding carbon dioxide using heating rates that could be produced using a small solar array during daylight use at Mars.

Rights

In Copyright. URI: http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ This Item is protected by copyright and/or related rights. You are free to use this Item in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights-holder(s).

DOI

10.25777/bs47-f169

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