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NOSE CONES THROUGH SINGLE AND MULTI-LAYER CHT ANALYSIS
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1 Geometry
1 Mesh
2 Simulation setups
4 Results
1 Geometry 1 Mesh 2 Simulation setups 4 ResultsAbout this project
The performance and survivability of high-speed aerospace vehicles strongly depend on the thermal loads experienced by the nose cone during supersonic flight. During Mach 2.5 operation, intense aerodynamic heating occurs due to shock compression, viscous dissipation, and boundarylayer effects. If not properly managed, this heating can lead to structural degradation, material softening, and catastrophic failure. This study presents a detailed computational investigation of thermal protection in rocket nose cones using Conjugate Heat Transfer (CHT) modeling in ANSYS Fluent. Phase 1 focuses on single-layer nose cone configurations made of Aluminum Alloy and Silicon Carbide (SiC). Both constant and temperature-dependent (piecewise linear) material properties are evaluated under Mach 2.5 supersonic flow with Discrete Ordinates (DO) radiation modeling. Results show that material property variation with temperature significantly affects thermal predictions. Aluminum Alloy exhibits severe thermal degradation under variable properties, reaching peak wall temperatures of 2460 K, while SiC demonstrates superior thermal resistance with comparatively lower peak values (2150 K). The findings confirm that single-layer metallic configurations are insufficient for sustained highspeed thermal environments and highlight the necessity of multi-layer Thermal Protection Systems (TPS) for improved survivability
