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Completed TRL 4 (started at 2, targeting 4)
Project Objective
To identify and understand the heat flux of a methane/oxygen rotating detonation rocket engine (RDRE).
Project Description
The underlying technology development for rotating detonation rocket engines (RDREs) requires a strong understanding of the heat transfer environment. Long-term goals for the project were to build a test facility to investigate the heat flux trends in a subscale water-cooled RDRE. UAH is utilizing internal research and development funds along with NASA CAN funds to evaluate this technology. Additive hardware was built in partnership with MSFC and tested at the university with significant data obtained.
Project Results and Conclusions
Several operating conditions were investigated ranging in variation of mixture ratio and average chamber pressure with the final product being reduced heat flux curves at each design point. Two configurations of hardware were tested and their trends compared. Overall, a strong understanding of what the general profiles look like have been obtained and, to a limited extent, how they scale with different conditions. These data were provided to NASA to be entered into a heat transfer database for RDREs to be disseminated to industry once a sufficient understanding of the data is achieved. Major lessons learned include the following; the heat transfer environment in an RDRE is far more extreme than traditional rocket engines, this limits the wall surface area for any given design, and it requires the use of all propellant (not just fuel) for cooling.
A broad range in heat transfer data was obtained and will be provided to US industry for use in a broad range of design efforts.
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