Thermal Protection Capability of Micro-explosive Chamber for Micro-thruster Array

Abstract

Accidental fire phenomenon, that the ignition of one microexplosive chamber element leads to that the adjacent ones are ignited, was a big problem for MEMS(Micro-Electro-Mechanical System)-based solid propellant micro-thruster arrays. In order to solve this problem, thermal protection capabilities of microexplosive chamber were modeled and simulated, and both the rectangle and annular isolation chambers were designed for comparison. The simulation results showed that the Pyrex 7740 glass-based micro-explosive chamber isolated heat better than the Si-based chamber. The maximum temperatures of the chamber adjacent to the central chamber decreased exponentially with the length increasing of rectangle isolation chamber, decreased linearly with the width increasing of rectangle isolation chamber, increased exponentially with the angle increasing of annular isolation chamber, and decreased exponentially with the radius increasing of annular isolation chamber, which were valuable for the design of MEMS-based solid propellant micro-thruster arrays.