ABLATIVE PLASTICS AND ELASTOMERS IN CHEMICAL PROPULSION ENVIRONMENTS
Abstract
Ablative plastics and elastomers have been used successfully in a variety of primary and secondary liquid propellant engines. The ablators have provided a minimum-weight design when the engine thrust levels were low to moderately high (up to 20,000 pounds), firing times were short to relatively long (up to 2,000 sec), chamber pressures were low (several hundred psia or less), or when the engine involved throttling, restarting, multiple pulses, or low propellant flow rates. The attractiveness of ablators for cooling tends to decrease with a nonoptimum propellant injector, high gasdynamic shear forces, or extremely corrosive combustion products. Ablative organics have scored even more impressive gains in the thermal protection of solid and hybrid propellant motors. Virtually the entire motor contains ablative polymers in one form or another, including the propellant case, head-end insulator, case liner, entrance cone, nozzle, exit cone, external insulator, propellant grain supports, igniter basket, and jet vanes, as well as the ground launch equipment which is immersed in the hot exhaust for several seconds.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Apr 01, 1965
- Accession Number
- AD0468420
Entities
People
- D. L. Schmidt
Organizations
- Air Force Research Laboratory