Temperature profile of a boundary-layer arc

Abstract

The interaction between an arc immersed in a high-speed gas flow and an adjacent plane surface has been studied experimentally. The high-speed flow is generated in a conventional pressure-driven shock tube and the arc is supplied by a charged capacitor bank.The thickness of the arc layer has been monitored using a streak camera, and it is found that the distance from the surface to the point of maximum brightness in the arc is, in fact, within about 30% of theoretical predictions. Microdensitometric analysis of the streak photographs together with the use of a simple power-law relationship between plasma luminosity and plasma temperature generate temperature profiles through the arc layer; again these are very similar to their theoretical counterparts.