Masters Theses

Keywords and Phrases

Ablation; CFD; Fluent; Hypersonics; Material Response; Surface Chemistry

Abstract

Accurate prediction of ablative thermal protection system (TPS) performance is critical for hypersonic vehicle design. However, numerical prediction of ablation remains challenging because results are influenced by complex physics and the choice of surface chemistry model and assumptions made in material response calculations. The objective of this work is to evaluate several carbon ablation models and their implementation within modern computational fluid dynamics (CFD) codes. Numerical simulations were performed using NASA’s LAURA flow solver and the commercial CFD code ANSYS Fluent, which coupled Navier-Stokes with surface chemistry models describing carbon oxidation, nitridation, and sublimation reactions. Several reaction sets were considered, including the Park, LAURA, Duffa, and Zhluktov & Abe (ZA) models. Simulations were conducted in arc-jet and free flight conditions with comparisons performed between codes for non-ablating, steady-state ablation, and transient material response simulations. Validation and comparison studies demonstrated generally good agreement between codes and with experiments, with differences in wall temperatures and heat fluxes being generally less than 2%. Comparisons between surface chemistry models in Fluent showed that the Park and LAURA models produce similar ablation rates in oxidation-dominated conditions, whereas the Duffa and ZA models predict substantially lower ablation rates. However, the models predicted increasingly similar ablation rates as the sublimation reactions become dominant. Comparisons between steady-state and material response simulations further demonstrate that neglecting transient conduction within the solid can affect predicted surface temperatures and recession behavior.

Advisor(s)

Hosder, Serhat

Committee Member(s)

Crawford, Bruce
Vigano, Davide

Department(s)

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering

Degree Name

M.S. in Aerospace Engineering

Publisher

Missouri University of Science and Technology

Publication Date

Spring 2026

Pagination

xiv, 162 pages

Note about bibliography

Includes_bibliographical_references_(pages 149-158)

Rights

© 2026 Andrew Steven Heider , All Rights Reserved

Document Type

Thesis - Open Access

File Type

text

Language

English

Thesis Number

T 12595

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