Acoustic Stability Prediction In Solid Rocket Motors

The ability for engineers to assess the impact of their preliminary design of solid rocket motor (SRM) performance and combustion stability is the focus of this proposal. The SRMs of the future will be designed for increased performance. Since ballistic excursions, instabilities, and sporadic forces on rocket motors have catastrophic results, Software and Engineering Associates, Inc. (SEA) has made considerable effort developing and maintaining codes for SRM performance and stability analysis. SEA has incorporated the Standard Stability Prediction (SSP) code into their Solid Performance Program (SPP), and will use these codes to improve the prediction of motor ballistic performance and stability of SRM grain designs. The modeling of the oscillatory forces on a motor given the change in pressure will be added to SPP. New and innovative methodologies will be implemented into SPP/SSP for analyzing strain augmented burning and multi-dimensional combustion stability in SRMs. These innovative technologies include using existing grain design technology, grid generation, a steady state Navier-Stokes (NS) solver and/or an Euler CFD code, and an acoustics eigensolver and linear stability analysis coupled with a structural solver. Investigation will center on the impact of strain augmented burning on ballistic performance and instabilities coupled with vortical flow.