Experimental modeling of three-dimensional modes of hypersonic flow past cylindrically-blunted bodies

Several sets of experimental studies of the structure of transverse hypersonic flow past blunt bodies (cylinder and truncated wedge) and heat transfer on them are performed in the UT-1M shock tube of the Central Aerohydrodynamics Institute. The purpose of the investigation was to obtain three-dimensional modes of hypersonic flow past the nose surfaces of blunt bodies in an artificially disturbed and nominally uniform flows. The controlled disturbances in the freestream were produced by thin threads pulled over the nozzle exit. In the experiment the flow was visualized using the Töpler method and the heat flux distribution over the cylinder was measured using luminescent temperature transformers. The experiments show that both the flow and the heat transfer in the vicinity of the cylinder nose are very sensitive to vortex disturbances in the oncoming hypersonic flow. In a nominally uniform flow (M_∞ = 8 and Re_∞ = 3160–11670) a steady three-dimensional mode of flow past the nose surface of a blunt wedge could be obtained in the form of a single vortex pair.