Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes Simulations of the HyShot II Scramjet

The internal flow in the HyShot II scramjet is investigated through numerical simulations. A computational infrastructure to solve the compressible Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes equations on unstructured meshes is introduced. A combustion model based on tabulated chemistry is considered to incorporate a detailed chemical kinetics mechanics while retaining a low computational cost. Both non-reactive and reactive simulations have been performed and results are compared with ground test measurements obtained at DLR. Different turbulence models were tested and the dependence on the mesh is assessed through grid refinement. The comparison with experimental data shows good agreement, although for the reactive case the computed heat fluxes at the wall are higher than measurements. A sensitivity analysis on the turbulent Schmidt and Prandtl numbers shows that the choice of these parameters has a strong influence on the results. In particular, variations of the turbulent Prandtl number lead to large changes in the heat flux at the walls. Finally, the inception of thermal choking is investigated by increasing the equivalence ratio, whereby a normal shock is created locally and moves upstream leading to a large increase in the maximum pressure. Nevertheless a large portion of the flow is still supersonic.