Design and performance evaluation of a high temperature axisymmetric plug nozzle

Abstract

In this study, a method for designing supersonic nozzles with axisymmetric plugs at high temperature has been proposed. The approach is based on the theory of Prandtl-Mayer expansion at high temperatures using the method of characteristics. For this purpose, a code in FORTRAN language was developed in order to obtain the nozzle design. Once the latter was obtained, we were interested in the evolution of the thermodynamic parameters of the flow such as pressure, temperature, and Mach number. The results achieved were confronted with those obtained for a perfect gas model. Regarding the design parameters (length, section ratio, thrust coefficient and mass coefficient), we found that the PG model gives very satisfactory results for values of 𝑀𝑀 and 𝑇𝑇0 below 2.00 and 1000 𝐾𝐾, respectively. As 𝑀𝑀𝐸𝐸 and 𝑇𝑇0 increase, this affects performance, requiring the use of our HT model to correct the calculations. In order to minimize the weight of this nozzle, this research is investigating the truncation of the Plug nozzle to increase its performances. All calculations were performed for air.