Advanced Hypersonic Test Facilities
This book presents a number of new, innovative approaches to satisfy the enthalpy requirements for air-breathing hypersonic vehicles and planetary entry problems.
TABLE OF CONTENTS Advanced Hypersonic Test Facilities
Chapter 15: NASA Glenn Research Center's Hypersonic Tunnel Facility
Brain Mark R. Woike [1] and P. Willis [2]
NASA Glenn Research Center, Plum Brook Station, Sandusky, Ohio
Copyright 2002 by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Inc. No copyright is asserted in the United States under Title 17, U.S. Code. The U.S. Government has a royalty-free license to exercise all rights under the copyright claimed herein for Governmental purposes. All other rights are reserved by the copyright owner.
I. Introduction
The NASA Glenn Research Center's Hypersonic Tunnel Facility (HTF) is a blow-down, free-jet wind tunnel that is capable of simulating Mach 5, 6, and 7 true enthalpy flight conditions. The HTF is unique because of its use of nonvitiated (clean air) flow. The high stagnation temperatures required for simulating true enthalpy conditions are produced by flowing clean nitrogen gas through a 3-MW graphite core storage heater. Clean gaseous oxygen is mixed with the heated gaseous nitrogen to yield the test medium of simulated air. Stagnation temperature, stagnation pressure, and altitude are controlled during tunnel operation to generate the desired test conditions. Three discrete hypersonic nozzles, each with a 1.07-m (42-in.) exit diameter, are used to set the facility Mach number conditions of 5, 6, and 7.
The facility's operation envelope is shown in Fig. 1. The facility operation spans from 20.7 to 36.6 km (68,000 to 120,000 ft) in altitude, 0.48 to 8.27 MPa (70 to 1200 psia) nozzle inlet stagnation pressure, and 1220 to 2170 K (2200 to 3900 R) nozzle inlet stagnation temperature.1 Table...
Copyright American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Inc. 2002 under license agreement with Books24x7
