A physical model for solving the dredging thermal protection system of hypersonic vehicle leading edge

The dredging thermal protection system is considered as a thermal protection method to prevent hypersonic vehicles whose leading edges work in the serious aerodynamic heating that seriously affects the performance and safety of the aircraft. This paper uses a special matrix splitting scheme and a high order accurate upwind compact difference scheme with group velocity control to solve the three-dimensional unsteady governing equations of the leading edge of the hypersonic vehicle. Fractal theory is introduced into the heat pipe wick model. The governing equation of the porosity of liquid components in the wick is derived. On the gas-liquid interface in the heat pipe, the temperature and pressure of the interface are determined by the Clapeyron equation that characterizing the relationship between saturation temperature and saturation pressure, assuming the temperature is the local saturation temperature. The distributions of temperature and density under the condition of different wedge half angles and heat pipes are studied by the coupled numerical simulation of the outer flow region of the aircraft and the internal region of heat pipes. The numerical results show that the high order accurate coupled computational method is reasonable and feasible.