Aerodynamic analysis of the aerospaceplane HyPlane in supersonic rarefied flow

Acta Astronautica, 2016

HyPlane is the Italian aerospaceplane proposal targeting, at the same time, both the space tourism and point-to-point intercontinental hypersonic flights. Unlike other aerospaceplane projects, relying on boosters or mother airplanes that bring the vehicle to high altitude, HyPlane will take off and land horizontally from common runways. According to the current project, HyPlane will fly sub-orbital trajectories under high-supersonic/low-hypersonic continuum flow regimes. It can go beyond the von Karman line at 100 km altitude for a short time, then starting the descending leg of the trajectory. Its aerodynamic behavior up to 70 km have already been studied and the results published in previous works. In the present paper some aspects of the aerodynamic behavior of HyPlane have been analyzed at 80, 90 and 100 km. Computer tests, calculating the aerodynamic parameters, have been carried out by a Direct Simulation Monte Carlo code. The effects of the Knudsen, Mach and Reynolds numbers have been evaluated in clean configuration. The effects of the aerodynamic surfaces on the rolling, pitching and yawing moments, and therefore on the capability to control attitude, have been analyzed at 100 km altitude. The aerodynamic behavior has been compared also with that of another aerospaceplane at 100 km both in clean and flapped configuration.

Acta Astronautica, 2015

In the present work a preliminary performance study regarding a small hypersonic airplane named HyPlane is presented. It is designed for long duration sub-orbital space tourism missions, in the frame of the Space Renaissance (SR) Italia Space Tourism Program. The vehicle is also consistent with a point-to-point medium range hypersonic trip, within the "urgent business travel" market segment. The design of such a hypersonic airplane is based on the concept of integrating available technologies developed for aeronautical and space atmospheric re-entry systems. The vehicle, characterized by high aerodynamic efficiency and low wing loading, is able to provide aerodynamic stability and manoeuvrability along the flight path and to produce a reduced sonic boom during cruise and supersonic descent approach, ensuring a very limited environmental impact. HyPlane, powered by Turbine Based Combined Cycle (TBCC) engines plus a throtteable Rocket, is able to perform Horizontal Takeoff and Horizontal Landing (HTHL) on runways. Aerodynamic and propulsive performances for the different flight regimes encountered during the missions are studied. Aerodynamic heating effects are analyzed, in order to identify suitable structures and materials design to sustain the hypersonic flight conditions. Different flight paths are also investigated, including hypersonic cruise and sub-orbital parabolic trajectories, which provide Space tourists with the opportunity of long duration missions, offering short and repeated periods of low-gravity, in the high stratosphere where a large view of the Earth is ensured.

Access to Space is still in its early stages of commercialization. Private enterprises have been making big progresses hoping to create a Space tourism business. Most of the attention is currently focused on suborbital Space Tourism, while orbital flights still appear limited and expensive. In the present work a preliminary study in the frame of the Space Renaissance (SR) Italia Space Tourism Program, regarding a small hypersonic airplane for a long duration space tourism mission named HyPlane, is presented. It is also consistent with a point-to-point medium range (5000 km) hypersonic trip, in the frame of the "urgent business travel" market segment. Main idea is to transfer technological solutions developed for aeronautical and space atmospheric re-entry systems to the design of such a hypersonic airplane. A winged vehicle characterized by high aerodynamic efficiency and able to manoeuvre along the flight path, in all aerodynamic regimes encountered, is taken into consideration. Rocket-Based Combined Cycle and Turbine-Based Combined Cycle engines are investigated to ensure higher performances in terms of flight duration and range. Different flight-paths are also considered, including sub-orbital parabolic trajectories and steady state hypersonic cruise. The former, in particular, takes advance of the high aerodynamic efficiency during the unpowered phase, in combination with a periodic engine actuation, to guarantee a long duration oscillating flight path. These trajectories offer Space tourists the opportunity of extended missions, characterized by repeated periods of low-gravity at altitudes high enough to ensure a wide view of the Earth from Space.

European Journal of Mechanics - B/Fluids, 2015

Accurate computations of aerodynamic forces are very important for the design of aerospace planes. In rarefied flow, the computation of momentum and energy transfer between the flow and the vehicle's surface occurs in two steps: incidence and re-emission of gas molecules. While incidence is well understood, the re-emission process is still today not yet completely clear, thus many models have been developed. In the present paper, the effects of the re-emission models by Maxwell and by Cercignani-Lampis-Lord have been compared by means of direct simulation Monte Carlo (DSMC) codes. Two different study cases have been considered: a complete aerospace plane and a wing profile. Computer simulations have been carried out using two DSMC codes to investigate hypersonic flows at an altitude of 120 km where for both the wing section and the vehicle the flow is in transitional regime. The results pointed out that the influence of the interaction models, considering specular, semi-specular and full diffusive re-emission is pretty strong, while the Cercignani-Lampis-Lord and the Maxwell models are almost equivalent.

International Journal of Engineering Applied Sciences and Technology, 2019

Global networking is the demand of the whole world and time plays a very crucial role in it, and it also plays a very important role in fastest and the reliable means of transport that become necessary, the Bullet train and the Hyper loop Projects are the live examples in that context, various countries from across the globe accept these project and as we all know that aviation sector id the one of the fastest growing means of transport across the world. Challenges faces by the machineries on the ground operation can be handled easily as compared to the air that's why after various research in the era of subsonic has been carried out by many developed countries firstly in the field of military in the form of the weapons and the when that technology proven safe and reliable it has become granted for commercial uses in that context era of supersonic flight the first one has been started on date 26September 1976 by Concord but as per the safety concerns the era of supersonic has closed in 24October 2003. Till now hypersonic platforms comes under in the form of fighter aircraft and reconnaissance aircraft and missile based platforms the demand of all these is to ensure the fastest approach towards the mission with least tile and more precision for the various control systems has been developed and still upgrading Hypersonic jets like very remarkable SR71 of USAF is mile stone in that ere problems occurring in the field of structural material, aerodynamic model and the robust control systems to operate in such a critical speed. It contains a huge present and future aspect of learning and developing new technologies. The demand of the space exploration with hypersonic technology is nearly impossible to predict without Hypersonic speed.

TRANSACTIONS OF THE JAPAN SOCIETY FOR AERONAUTICAL AND SPACE SCIENCES, AEROSPACE TECHNOLOGY JAPAN, 2016

With the aims of creating and validating innovative fundamental technologies for high-speed atmospheric flights, a small scale supersonic flight experiment vehicle is designed as a flying test bed. An aerodynamic configuration is proposed for the 2nd-generation vehicle with a cranked-arrow main wing and a single Air Turbo Ramjet Gas-generator-cycle (ATR-GG) engine. Its longitudinal, lateral, and control surface aerodynamics are characterized through intensive wind-tunnel tests. They are found to be quite moderate except that the directional stability deteriorates severely at large angles of attack and side slip, and that the elevon deflections for roll control cause adverse yaw. These aerodynamic anomalies will result in a tendency of roll reversal at large angles of attack. It can be prevented to some extent by coordinated rudder deflections. In addition, necessity of transonic drag reduction is clarified through thrust margin and flight capability analyses. Probability of 5 to 20 % drag reduction in the transonic regime (Mach 0.8 to 1.2) is demonstrated by configuration modification on the basis of the area rule at Mach 1.1.

The ultimate objective of making the world smaller place and being able to fly to any point in just couple of hours which can be possible with “hypersonic aircraft”. This is aircraft moves with 7 times more than the speed of the sound i.e. (7 Mach). This aircraft uses air breathing type supersonic ramjet (scramjet) engine. having speed near about 7700 km/hr. nasa’s x-43 (hyper-x) is one of the hypersonic aircraft, which is construct with title based thermal protection system, carbon-carbon composites and high temperature resistance metal with gaseous hydrogen fuel in engine. This aircraft is carried out by booster rocket up to its test altitude of 100000 ft. where it separates from the booster and files under pre-programmed control system.

17th AIAA International Space Planes and Hypersonic Systems and Technologies Conference, 2011

Hypersonic Turbojet Experimental vehicle is a vehicle proposed for the flight test at Mach 5. The capacity of the installing equipment has increased at recent design review. Therefore, it is necessary to increase the body volume. In this study, aerodynamic performance of this vehicle was examined to evaluate effect of body volume on aerodynamic performance. And effect of body shape on aerodynamic performance was evaluated. As the results, the body height is found not to affect the longitudinal static stability, but the directional static stability. And the effect of flow around airframe on aerodynamic performance is small.

Journal of Fluids and Structures, 2004

This paper presents a fundamental study of the aeroelastic behavior of hypersonic vehicles. Two separate configurations are examined. First, a typical cross-section analysis of a double-wedge airfoil in hypersonic flow is performed using three different types of unsteady airloads: piston theory and complete Euler and Navier-Stokes solutions based on computational fluid dynamics. The analysis of the double-wedge airfoil is used to justify the usage of the simple aerodynamics for a reusable launch vehicle (RLV). Subsequently, the aeroelastic problem for a complete vehicle that resembles an RLV in trimmed flight is considered, using approximate first-order piston theory aerodynamics. The results provided for these configurations provide guidelines for approximate aeroelastic modelling of hypersonic vehicles.

Theoretical and Computational Fluid Dynamics, 2022

Flow phenomena on maneuverable vehicles that fly at hypersonic speeds and altitudes that reach the Earth's upper stratosphere and lower mesosphere pose challenges that collectively form one of the present-day research frontiers of Fluid Mechanics. Research agencies around the world have realized the multiple benefits derived from transitioning a deeper understanding of hypersonic flow phenomena to actual flying platforms, and support for hypersonic research has increased substantially in the last decade. The result can be seen in Fig. , showing the distribution over years and originating countries of a total of 26,300 peer-reviewed research papers that have been published since the word hypersonic first appeared in the literature in the early 1940s and have this word in their title. Early peak activity subsided after the Moon landing, but soon picked up in the early 80s and again around the turn of the century, growing monotonically to the present day. As also shown in Fig. , a breakdown by country of origin reveals that two-thirds of the total number of hypersonic publications originate from the USA and China, giving rise to concerns raised by strategic think-tanks [57] and policy advisers regarding potential misuse of hypersonic technology. Hypersonic research has not always come to the limelight on account of potential strategic conflicts. The high plateau in number of papers published around the 1990s, shown in the left plate of Fig. , corresponds