Simulation of the Effect of Nanoparticles on Improvement of Regenerative Cooling in Liquid Propellant Engine

The presence of high combustion temperatures requires effective cooling methods in the combustion chamber. Most chambers in liquid propellant engines have regenerative cooling. A new way to improve heat transfer performance in the regenerative cooling process is to add nanoparticles to the cooling fluid. In this study, the regenerative cooling in a liquid propellant engine was simulated numerically by fluent software. The engine is designed to work on a mixture of kerosene as fuel and liquid oxygen as an oxidizer with a thrust of 300 kN. In the following, carbon nanotubes and alumina nanoparticles were used in 2% and 5% volume fraction to be added to kerosene for nanofluid production. In this study, the fluid flow in the three-dimensional cooling channel is assumed to be steady-state, turbulent and the k-ε turbulence model is used for turbulent flow, and the nanofluids are modeled as single-phase. Addition of nanoparticles alumina and carbon nanotube to kerosene as cooling fluid increased the heat transfer coefficient by 8% and 15%, respectively. According to the results, carbon nanotubes have a higher ability to increase heat transfer coefficient and improve regenerative cooling than alumina nanoparticle.