Liquid Rocket Engine Combustor Simulations by Flamelet-Based Model and Flux-Reconstruction Method

Large-eddy simulations are performed for liquid rocket engine combustors by solving the compressible Navier-Stokes equations with the flamelet progress variable model. To account for real-gas thermodynamics and transport of the cryogenic propellants, the Soave-Redlich-Kwong equation of state and Chung’s model are used. JAXA's in-house solver “LS-FLOW-HO” based on the high-order flux-reconstruction scheme is employed on overset unstructured hexahedral grids. First, a single coaxial injector case tested at JAXA Kakuda Space Center is considered. To reproduce the injector acoustic modes with proper upstream boundary conditions, the geometry of the injection manifolds is included in the simulation. The computed power spectral density (PSD) of the pressure was compared with the experimental data, and the overall characteristics agreed reasonably well. Next, LES of DLR BKD 42 injectors is conducted. The computed combustion pressure and the PSD for a higher hydrogen temperature condition agree fairly well with the experimental data. Finally, preliminary results of the LE-X full combustor simulation with over 500 injectors are presented.