Abstract
An open source Direct Simulation Monte Carlo (DSMC) code, called as dsmcFoam in OpenFOAM, is used to study a blunt body with the shape of a space crew capsule return vehicle. The rarefied gas has the Knudsen number with 0.03. The flow with a Mach number 4.35 over the capsule was simulated by DSMC. The distributions of velocity field and temperature around the capsule were calculated. This study may provide some useful information for the reentry of the return vehicle.
Highlights
When the blunt body space capsules turn back to the Earth, the reentry process will undergo the process from rarefied to continuum regimes
The solver named as dsmcFoam is developed in OpenFOAM to perform the direct simulation Monte Carlo [11]
The geometry model of the blunt body space capsule is used same as the Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV) [13]
Summary
When the blunt body space capsules turn back to the Earth, the reentry process will undergo the process from rarefied to continuum regimes. A common example of flow regime, where the Boltzmann equation would be necessary, is the operation of flight vehicles in the upper atmosphere. Many methods, such as analytical solutions, the finite pointset method and Boltzmann CFD etc. The direct simulation Monte Carlo (DSMC) method, which is regarded as a numerical method for solving the Boltzmann equation, is developed. Since Graeme Bird in 1961 [6] introduced the direct simulation Monte Carlo (DSMC) method, this method has been used to solve many engineering problems from planetary spacecraft reentry [3,7,8] to micro-scale rarefied gas flows [4,5,9]. The simulation is under supersonic conditions with a Mach number 4.35
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