Tubular Copper Thrust Chamber Design Study

Abstract

Tube bundle construction is one of the least expensive, shortest lead time, and most developed means of fabricating rocket engine thrust chambers. Most production engine thrust chambers before the Space Shuttle Main Engine (SSME) were fabricated from tube bundles. At the high combustion pressures of the SSME, high material thermal conductivity is essential to minimize hot-wall thermal gradients. Copper is the only suitable construction material with adequate conductivity to meet this requirement. Since conventional tube bundle construction requires brazing, and conventional copper alloys cannot be brazed without a prohibitive loss in tensile strength, alternative means of producing copper thrust chambers (i.e., milled channel construction) had to be developed. This type of construction is very costly, requires extensive lead time, and produces serious low-cycle fatigue life limitations.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
May 01, 1992
Accession Number
ADA250562

Entities

People

  • A. I. Masters
  • D. E. Galler

Organizations

  • Pratt & Whitney

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Weapons Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Combustion
  • Combustion Chambers
  • Computer Programs
  • Construction
  • Fuel Pumps
  • Fuel Systems
  • Geometry
  • Heat Transfer
  • Heat Transfer Coefficients
  • Isotherms
  • Mach Number
  • Materials
  • Plastic Explosives
  • Tensile Strength
  • Thrust Chambers
  • Turbines
  • Two Dimensional

Fields of Study

  • Physics

Readers

  • Combustion and Flow Dynamics.
  • Metallurgy
  • Systems Analysis and Design

Technology Areas

  • Space
  • Space - Hall-Effect Thruster