Boundary Layer Transit Flight Experiment: Mission Overview, Launch Vehicle and Payload Subsystems

The objective of the Boundary Layer Transition (BOLT) flight experiment is to investigate the hypersonic boundary-layer transition mechanisms on a low-curvature concave surface with a swept leading edge at Mach numbers between five and seven. This shall be achieved during a captive-carry flight experiment on an S31/Improved Orion sounding rocket. The BOLT project is coordinated by the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory U.S. Air Force Office of Scientific Research and will be carried out in collaboration with the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory Aerospace Systems Directorate, the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, and a multiorganization team of researchers. DLR, German Aerospace Center’s Mobile Rocket Base (DLR MORABA) is responsible for the development of the required mission and flight profile, layout and adaption of the launch vehicle, as well as the provision of payload subsystems for attitude control, time synchronization, data telemetry, despin, and separation. DLR MORABA will complete ground testing, coordinates, and conducts launch operations; and it will support postflight analysis. This paper presents these contributions in detail.