TRR 40:  Technological Foundations for the Design of Thermally and Mechanically Highly Loaded Components of Future Space Transportation Systems

• Subject Area: Thermal Engineering/Process Engineering ; Mechanical and Industrial Engineering ; Materials Science and Engineering ; Mathematics
• Term: from 2008 to 2020
• Website: Homepage
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 26293245

Next-generation space transportation systems will be based on rocket propulsion systems, which deliver the best compromise between development and production cost and performance. The Transregional Collaborative Research Centre focusses on liquid rocket propulsion systems and their integration into the space transportation system. Atmospheric reentry of reusable space transportation systems is not subject of investigation in this project. Instead, specific problems of rocket propulsion systems are the main focus of the Transregional Collaborative Research Centre.
Critical, thermally and mechanically highly loaded components of such space transportation systems are the combustion chamber, the nozzle, the aft body and structure cooling. These components offer the highest potential for the efficiency increase of the entire system. However, all components are in close and direct interaction with each other. Optimisation or even the fundamental new design of a single component directly affects all other components. Therefore, the investigation of individual components separate from the others leads to suboptimal results.
The nozzle flow and its interaction with the nozzle structure is the focus of research area D (fluid-structure interaction). Detailed phenomenological investigations of combustion-chambre flows and its numerical modelling are the main area of interest in research area C (combustion-chamber thermofluiddynamics). The investigation of heat transfer and the analysis of new cooling concepts for hot structures in the combustion chambre and nozzle are the main focus in research area A (structure cooling). Problems of aft-body flow and its interaction with the nozzle flow will be dealt with in research area B (aft-body flow).
The scientific focus of all four research areas within the Transregional Collaborative Research Centre is the analysis and the modelling of coupled systems. Based on reference experiments detailed numerical models are developed, which serve as basis for efficient and reliable predictive simulation tools for design. The main objectives of the Transregional Collaborative Research Centre are new concepts for rocket nozzles, alternative fuels and an optimisation of the combustion chamber, new methods for aft-body flow control and innovative cooling methods for propulsion components.

• DFG Programme: CRC/Transregios
• International Connection: Netherlands

Completed projects

• A01 - Multiscale techniques for the simulation of coolant flow through porous media (Project Heads Dahmen, Wolfgang ;  Müller, Siegfried )
• A02 - Film cooling in rocket nozzles (Project Head Olivier, Herbert )
• A03 - Heat transfer in pulsating flow and its impact on temperature distribution and damping performance of resonators (Project Head Polifke, Ph.D., Wolfgang )
• A04 - Numerical simulation of film cooling in supersonic flow (Project Head Kloker, Markus J. )
• A05 - Innovative cooling techniques of rocket combustion chambers (Project Heads Boehrk, Hannah ;  Hald, Hermann ;  von Wolfersdorf, Jens )
• B01 - Experimental analysis of the interaction phenomena between hot nozzle flow and transonic external flow (Project Head Gülhan, Ali )
• B02 - Untersuchung der Beeinflussung der Heckströmung durch einzelne und mehrere Düsen im Unter- und Transschall (Project Head Henke, Rolf )
• B03 - Numerical analysis of controlled turbulent wake flow (Project Heads Meinke, Matthias ;  Schröder, Wolfgang )
• B04 - Experimental Characterization of Axisymmetric Base Flows with Propulsive Jet (Project Heads Radespiel, Rolf ;  Scholz, Peter )
• B05 - Numerical characterization of hot nozzle wall impact on launch vehicle base flows (Project Heads Eggers, Thino ;  Hannemann, Klaus ;  Hannemann, Volker )
• B06 - Characterization and control of the interactions of a partially and a fully flowing 2D generic dual-bell nozzle with the afterbody flow (Project Head Kähler, Christian Joachim )
• C01 - Modelling of injection, mixing and combustion in rocket engines under real-gas conditions (Project Heads Hickel, Stefan ;  Pfitzner, Michael ;  Stemmer, Christian )
• C03 - Modeling of High Frequency Combustion Instabilities in Rocket Engines (Project Head Sattelmayer, Thomas )
• C04 - Experimental and numerical investigations of phase transitions processes in the transcritical region (Project Heads Lamanna, Grazia ;  Munz, Claus-Dieter ;  Weigand, Bernhard )
• C05 - Numerical Simulation of Rocket Combustors with Sub- and Supercritical Injection with As-sumed and Transported PDF Methods (Project Head Gerlinger, Peter )
• C06 - Modelling of heat transfer in combustion-chamber boundary layers (Project Heads Hickel, Stefan ;  Pfitzner, Michael ;  Stemmer, Christian )
• C07 - Interaction of acoustics and combustion in rocket engine combustion chambers (Project Heads Hardi, Justin ;  Oschwald, Michael )
• D01 - Gekoppelte Lösung von Aerothermoelastizitätsproblemen im Überschall (Project Heads Behr, Ph.D., Marek ;  Reimerdes, Hans-Günther )
• D02 - Mechanical integrity of Thermal Barrier Coatings - Coating Development and Micromechanics (Project Heads Bäker, Martin ;  Rösler, Joachim )
• D03 - Lifetime prediction of nozzle structures under streaming conditions (Project Heads Haupt, Matthias ;  Reese, Stefanie )
• D04 - Heat transfer in nozzle cooling channels (Project Heads Adams, Nikolaus Andreas ;  Wall, Wolfgang A. ;  Yoshihara, Lena )
• D05 - Modelle zur Lebensdauerabschätzung von metallischen und keramischen Strukturen (Project Head Kröplin, Bernd-Helmut )
• D06 - Experimental investigations on fluid-structure interaction using generic configurations (Project Heads Esser, Burkard ;  Gülhan, Ali )
• D07 - Development of novel Ceramic Matrix Composites for Rocket Nozzles (Project Heads Frieß, Martin ;  Koch, Dietmar )
• D09 - Experimental investigations for lifetime prediction (Project Heads Haidn, Oskar ;  Haupt, Matthias ;  Scholz, Peter )
• D10 - Simulation technologies for thermal buckling in aerothermodynamically loaded thin-walled structures (Project Head Reese, Stefanie )
• K01 - K01Experimental and numerical investigation of combustion and heat transfer in rocket thrust chambers (Project Heads Haidn, Oskar ;  Knab, Oliver )
• K01 - Experimental and numerical investigation of combustion and heat transfer in thrust chambers (Project Head Haidn, Oskar )
• K02 - K02 Investigation of dual bell nozzles in application oriented conditions (Project Heads Génin, Chloé ;  Stark, Ralf H. )
• K02 - Experimental and numerical investigation of dual bell nozzle flow under realistic flight conditions (Project Head Génin, Chloé )
• Z - Zentrale Aufgaben des Sonderforschungsbereichs Transregio 40 (Project Head Adams, Nikolaus Andreas )

• Applicant Institution: Technische Universität München (TUM)
• Co-Applicant Institution: Rheinisch-Westfälische Technische Hochschule Aachen; Technische Universität Braunschweig; Universität Stuttgart; Universität der Bundeswehr München
• Participating Institution: Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt e.V. (DLR); Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt e.V. (DLR); Standort Stuttgart
• Business and Industry: Airbus Group
• Spokesperson: Professor Dr.-Ing. Nikolaus Andreas Adams