A thermal compensated model for predicting the internal combustion of energetic materials in a combustion chamber

Abstract

Abstract Influences of heat losses on the performances of thermal systems driven by internal combustions are unavoidable. Methods to compensate the heat losses are very important for improving the fidelity of numerical predictions. In this paper, a thermal compensated model was put forward for predicting the combustion of energetic materials in a gun propulsion system. Different from the existing models, the heat exchanges between the combustion products and the inner walls of the chamber were considered in the energy conversion equation. The modified two-phase fluid flow model governing the combustion was solved by using a Godunov type of numerical scheme. The exchanged heat was obtained by predicting the transient heat transfer in the barrel based on a finite element method. Based on the modified model and the coupled computational framework, the combustion of energetic materials in a launching process was studied and the influences of the heat losses on the combustion were discussed. The results indicate that the modified model can effectively compensate the heat losses for thermal systems. The work provides an accurate method to compensate heat losses for evaluating the system performances.