Novel Combinational Aerodisk and Lateral Jet Concept for Drag and Heat Reduction in Hypersonic Flows

Hypersonic vehicles have attracted lasting and worldwide attention in recent years. Considerable aerodynamic drag and severe aerothermal loads are major challenges for hypersonic vehicles. A novel combinational aerodisk and lateral jet concept is proposed for drag reduction and thermal protection in hypersonic flows. The flow field characteristics have been numerically investigated with in-house code. The Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) equations were adopted to simulate the flow field, and the shear stress transport (SST) k- turbulence model was used to present the turbulent nature. Fluid-thermal interaction is also taken into consideration in this paper. The influences of the lateral jet pressure ratio and its location on the flow field have been thoroughly studied using numerical methods. The obtained results demonstrate that the novel concept is beneficial for drag reduction and thermal protection in hypersonic flows. Increasing the lateral jet pressure ratio can further improve drag reduction performance. In addition, the heat flux can be significantly reduced by increasing the lateral jet pressure ratio. The lateral jet location also has important effects on the flow properties. The peak values of the Stanton number and wall static pressure can even be reduced by 19.76% and 22.15%, respectively, with different lateral jet locations.