Ricerc@Sapienza

Liquid Rocket Engines (LREs) represent a widespread technology in the space industry and are undergoing a deep innovation process in order to meet both the demanding requirements of performance, reliability and costs and the recently emerged issue of reusability. Crucial in the propulsion system design process is the thermal load characterization, being the engine operating life strongly dependant on the wall temperature. Concurrently a reliable modeling of the propellants is needed to properly describe their fluid-dynamic and reactive behavior inside engine components such as cooling channels, injectors and combustion chamber. This is of paramount importance when considering that propellants in LREs operate in a region referred to as "trans-critical", since they are stored at temperature below their critical values but operate in the combustion chamber and its cooling system at high pressure exceeding the critical point. In such a condition the mixture behavior deviates by the ideal model being dominated by real gas effects. Among the most recently proposed fuels, methane is showing many advantages over other commonly used hydrocarbons in terms of efficiency and storability easiness, however its fluid dynamics in proximity of the critical condition is still widely unknown, thus requiring further understanding and modeling.

This research project proposes the development of a solver capable of simulating the propellant turbulent flow and combustion inside the various engine components and the heat exchange with the solid walls, thus being predictive on the wall thermal loads. Simulation will be supported by an accurate thermophysical model describing high pressure turbulent flames and a near-wall treatment consistent with the LRE-like conditions.