How can designers of hypersonic aircraft overcome the ‘heat barrier’ using simulation to better understand aerothermal shape distortion (aka aerothermoelasticity, or fluid-structural-thermal interaction - FTSI)? This guest blog by ADFA explains how multiphysics simulation helps designers of hypersonic vehicles account for aerothermal shape distortion (which can compromise a hypersonic vehicle’s aerodynamic performance) through to the risk of catastrophic material failures, using tools that can simulate both the aerodynamics as well as the thermal and structural response.
Founded in 2018 to participate in the Australian Universities Rocket Competition (AURC), students from the Australian National University’s (ANU) Rocketry team are striving to develop a rocket capable of passing the boundary of outer space and being safely recovered by parachute upon re-entry. This lofty goal has led the team to move away from commercially available solid-fuel propelled rockets to develop their own in-house designed bipropellant liquid-fuel engine, with the help of Ansys aerothermal analysis to predict the heat flux at the space rocket’s leading edges during its hypersonic ascent phase.