TABLE OF CONTENTS Aerothermodynamic phenomena in the context of this book are the so-called real-gas effects and flow phenomena related to hypersonic flight. Hypersonic flight usually is defined as flight at Mach numbers M ? 5. Here appreciable real-gas effects begin to appear. In this chapter we discuss the important real-gas phenomena with the goal to understand them and their implications in vehicle design [34].
The basic distinction regarding real-gas phenomena is that between thermally and calorically perfect or imperfect gases. The thermally perfect gas obeys the equation of state p = ? RT. A calorically perfect gas has constant specific heats c p and c upsilon;. We speak about a "perfect" or "ideal gas", if both is given.
A gas can be thermally perfect, but calorically imperfect. An example is air as we treat it usually in aerothermodynamics. If a gas is thermally imperfect, it will also be calorically imperfect, and hence is a "real gas". We note, however, that in the aerothermodynamic literature, and also in this book, the term "real gas" is used in a broader, but in a strict sense incorrect, way to describe gases, which are thermally perfect and calorically imperfect. We will see in the following that real-gas effects in aerothermodynamics usually are high-temperature real-gas effects.
We first have a look at the "classical" real gas, the van der Waals gas. After that the high-temperature real-gas effects are treated, which are of major interest in aerothermodynamics. Essentially, we consider air...
