Thermo-mechanical coupling behavior of plate structure under re-entry aerodynamic environment

Abstract

A coupled thermo-mechanical finite element (TMFE) algorithm with the computable model on damping effects is proposed to simulate the thermo-mechanical coupling behavior and damping characteristics of a plate structure under re-entry aerodynamic environment. Firstly, an unconditionally stable implicit FE algorithm considering damping effects is constructed. Based on the coupled transient heat conduction problem, the proposed algorithm is verified through comparing the analytical and numerical solution. Combined with the gas-kinetic unified algorithm (GKUA), the aerodynamic force and heating are calculated as the temperature and pressure boundary conditions for the thermo-mechanical coupling calculation. The aerodynamic-structure boundary coupling verification is realized by comparing the GKUA calculated value of the flow field boundary with the TMFE results on the temperature and pressure of the plate surface. Then, the influences of element mesh density, inertia term, coupling term and damping effect on the thermo-mechanical coupling response of a plate are studied. The variation laws among temperature, displacement and stress fields are deeply revealed. The proposed algorithm offers a novel pathway to predict thermal flutter induced by thermo-mechanical coupling response of spacecraft structure.