Unsteady Testing of an Ablation Sensor in Torch Flame

Abstract

Operational characteristics of an ablation sensor embedded into an ablative test specimen are examined under a time-varying heating profile using an oxy-hydrogen gas torch test set up. The time-varying heating profile is given to replicate temporal variation of surface temperature encountered in an atmospheric entry heating condition of a space vehicle. This study demonstrates the detected performance of the surface recession and char sensors for the case of the OREX flight condition. The result shows that the present ablation sensor can monitor ablation behaviors of the test specimen while detecting the difference of the ablating history in between time-dependent and time-independent heating profiles.