Abstract
A solid rocket motor is one of the critical components of solid missiles, and its life and reliability mostly depend on the mechanical behavior of a composite solid propellant (CSP). Effective mechanical properties are critical material constants to analyze the structural integrity of propellant grain. They are estimated by a numerical method that combines the Voronoi cell finite element method (VCFEM) and the homogenization method in the present paper. The correctness of this combined method has been validated by comparing with a standard finite element method and conventional theoretical models. The effective modulus and the effective Poisson’s ratio of a CSP varying with volume fraction and component material properties are estimated. The result indicates that the variations of the volume fraction of inclusions and the properties of the matrix have obvious influences on the effective mechanical properties of a CSP. The microscopic numerical analysis method proposed in this paper can also be used to provide references for the design and the analysis of other large volume fraction composite materials.
Highlights
A composite solid propellant (CSP), a highly packed particulate composite, is a prime structural material of a solid rocket motor in addition to an energetic material
Various experimental and numerical studies demonstrate that the mechanical properties of the CSP can be highly sensitive to the microstructural morphology such as the dimension, shape, distribution, and properties of the inclusion
The results showed that when the representative volume element (RVE) size is greater than 1500 μm, its effective modulus remained stable
Summary
A composite solid propellant (CSP), a highly packed particulate composite, is a prime structural material of a solid rocket motor in addition to an energetic material. The effect of orientation and shape of oxidizer particles on the burning rate was examined by a direct numerical simulation approach developed by Plaud et al [8] Another group of models published devoted to estimate mechanical properties of propellants in recent years. The conventional finite element method requires complex grid element and huge computational costs, which limits replication and application in microstructure analysis; very small elements may occur owing to the fact that the space among the inclusion is too narrow to create a perfect mesh They have to shrink particles in contact with other particles or reduce the volume fraction to create high-quality meshes [7, 12]. A simple case is analyzed to understand the influence of microstructural morphology on the effective modulus and effective Poisson ratio of the CSP
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