Effects of Nozzle Geometries on Thrust Performance Improvement of Micro-Multi-Nozzle-Array Thrusters

Abstract

Microfabrication of a 3 x 3 micro-plasmajet array with ultra-violet lasers and their thrust performance tests were conducted for nozzle elements with exit height of 0.5 mm and length of 1 mm. To evaluate the thrust characteristics of the nozzle-array, its thrust performance was compared with a single-nozzle. The thrust was measured by a calibrated cantilever-type thrust stand in vacuum. From the thrust performance tests, significant improvement of the thrust of each nozzle element with mass flow was obtained with the nozzle-arrays than those of only using a single-nozzle through multi-jet interaction phenomena.