Conjugate heat transfer applied to transitory analysis for rocket engine cooling systems design

This study investigates the use of an in-house Conjugate Heat Transfer (CHT) numerical solver for the modelling of transient phenomena in liquid rocket engines active cooling systems. Heat transfer considerations place great limitations in the development of rocket engines and transient operative conditions are amongst the most critical. The current lack of models and numerical tools capable of accounting for the complexities of this time-dependent multi-physics problem, results in oversized cooling systems, long development times and increased risk of failure. The fine modelling of all the involved phenomena and their interaction with each other is crucial to achieve a correct prediction of the thermal fluxes and wall temperatures involved. Hence, CHT simulations are the state-of-the-art for this application. The CHT solver proposed in this work utilizes a partitioned coupling strategy where two extensively validated single-physics solvers exchange information through their interfaces at discrete time steps. A simplified version of the RL-10A-3-3A regenerative cooling jacket is considered as reference to test the strengths and the limits of this approach. Both a complete chilldown of the engine and part of the start-up transient have been simulated. The analyses performed show the ability of the solver proposed to deal with transient phenomena where fluid-structure interaction occurs. In addition, they provide a complete overview of the numerical issues related to the partitioned coupling approach. These preliminary results pave the way for further developments aimed at increasing the reliability of the solutions and extending the application field of the software developed.