Shock wave experiments in a high-temperature gas flow

Abstract

To simulate the aerodynamic heating environment for a hypervelocity vehicle, various ground test facilities have been developed and constructed. An arc-heated wind tunnel is one of these facilities and features long operational time; thus the arc-heated wind tunnel has been used mainly for the development and evaluation of a thermal protection system for space transportation systems. Several types of arc heaters (such as Huels, Segment, Constrictor and MPD) have been adopted as a plasma generator, and their electric power scales are in the range of 10 kW-100 MW. Thus generated plasma flows can be employed for the experiments of aerodynamic heating and heat protection systems but also to reveal the physical phenomenon across a shock wave in a high-temperature plasma flow.