CFD Analysis (1 DOF) of Rocket Stablity

This presentation/video provides the context for this project:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c7-upWuMalA&t=116s&ab_channel=JacobQiu

https://www.canva.com/design/DAF29_ay0pA/wrN8AThly7MfmTJA2QqBRg/view?utm_content=DAF29_ay0pA&utm_campaign=designshare&utm_medium=link&utm_source=editor

The objective of this assignment was to find a variable to optimize for a CFD simulation. We decided to try and find the best rocket-body shape to optimize two parameters: return to steady state time after a perturbation, and stability at steady state.

My Partner (Owen Niu) and I wanted to simulate something a little more complex. We wanted to model a 3-D rocket with 6 DOF traveling in some fluid mesh. However, we were limited by our primitive hardware, and the hard to acquire resources on how to set up a properly deforming 3-D mesh. This is the next step for this project.

Keeping in mind the 2 week deadline we had for simulation time. We were reconsidered the scope of our project, and decided to simulate a 2-D rocket with 1-DOF. The Theta of the rocket about it's center axis during each time step can be used to determine the angular acceleration of the rocket itself. With the lift and drag out puts from the simulation, we can roughly determine the vertical force into the rocket body. This allows us to determine the distance between the center of mass and center of pressure. This effective center of pressure was similar to within 10 percent of the analytical center of pressure.

With residuals to e-6, we can expect only mildly accurate simulation data. If this project were to recieve an update: further refinement of the fluid mesh, and tweaks to the solution set up would be areas to focus on.

Results:
None of the results from this simulation can tell us much about real supersonic flight. However, it did help us develop our research and simulation prowess. We found that the rocket with a fin angle of 25 degrees allowed this specific rocket geometry to stablize the most quickly.