Abstract
Nowadays, the use of baffle plates is anticipated to be one of potential devices used to dampen the sloshing of propellant in rocket tanks. However, some of previous studies reported that the use of a baffle plate may cause larger pressure fluctuations in the tank. In this study, aiming at damping the sloshing without a baffle plate, we paid attention to the characteristic that liquid oxygen is paramagnetic and numerically investigated damping effect of a magnetic field when liquid oxygen sloshing occurs. An incompressible gas–liquid two-phase flow of gaseous oxygen and liquid oxygen was assumed in a spherical spacecraft tank with a diameter of 1 m in a non-gravitational field, and a triangular impact force was assumed to be imposed as the excitation force. In addition, an electric circular coil was placed outside the spherical tank to generate a static magnetic field. For the sake of simplicity, the effect of heat was not taken into consideration. As a result of computation, the sloshing was damped to a certain extent when the magnetic flux density at the coil center was 1.0 T, and a sufficient damping effect was obtained by setting it to 3.0 T. In fact, it is anticipated that less than 3.0 T is sufficient if the coil is placed on the tank surface. This may contribute to damping of the movement of the center of gravity of a spacecraft and prevention of mixing of ullage gas into the piping.
Highlights
In a dynamic acceleration environment caused by changes in the thrust and attitude of a spacecraft, the liquid with a free surface in the propellant tank oscillates violently
We numerically investigated the damping effect of the magnetic field when liquid oxygen sloshing in a tank occurred
It is considered that the magnetizing force exerted in the tank was weak and the effect of damping of the sloshing was insufficient when the magnetic flux density at the center of the coil was 0.1 T
Summary
In a dynamic acceleration environment caused by changes in the thrust and attitude of a spacecraft, the liquid with a free surface in the propellant tank oscillates violently. When very low temperature liquid and relatively high temperature gas coexist inside of the tank, heat exchange and phase change between gas and liquid are promoted by the sloshing, and the tank pressure drops quickly, resulting in a unstable supply of propellant and in a cavitation at an entry of a turbopump [3,4,5]. There is another risk that the thrust control becomes difficult. The other previous study reports that the reason for this is that the liquid
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