Modeling a Xenon Tank, its Heat Convection and In-Orbit Behavior with a 2D CFD Method

Kurzfassung

Xenon becomes increasingly important as a propellant for spacecrafts. As part of the development process, the thermal control of the tank during the loading and unloading procedure has to be designed. To aid in this task, a 2D model of xenon inside its tank during the pressurization and depressurization process, specifically for a zero-g environment, has been created using OpenFOAM. The physical theory behind fluid flows as well as the methodology the model creation is based upon and the used numerical settings are presented. The model was applied to compute the fluid properties and heat flow during xenon loading and unloading for the ESPRIT project. When comparing the results to 0D/1D simulations performed by EcosimPro and an internal Excel tool, phenomena not modeled with these approaches could be observed in the OpenFOAM results. This makes it a valuable addition to the tools available during the design of the propulsion system.