Numerical investigation of aerodynamic and aero-thermal effects for hypersonic vehicles

Hypersonic flow field has been numerically investigated for two different configurations, to study the aerodynamic/aero-thermal effects. Simulations were performed using an in-house hybrid unstructured Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes solver (HUNS3D). Four different flux differencing schemes (central scheme and three upwind schemes AUSM+, AUSM+up, Roe) were employed for spatial discretization. The accuracy of all the schemes was compared with each other and with the available experimental data. Different levels of meshes were generated to investigate the effect of grid resolution. The pressure distribution was not much influenced by the mesh resolution; however the predicted heat flux was greatly affected by the change in the mesh resolution. The shock position has been accurately captured by the Central, AUSM+ and AUSM+up schemes. The predicted pressure distribution was in good agreement with the experimental data but some difference was observed in the robustness of flux differencing schemes. The increase in the wall temperature gives rise to flow separation which eventually affects the aerodynamic/aero-thermal heating. After the separation zone the flow reattachment enhances the surface heat transfer dramatically.