Experimental Apparatus to Study Forced Convection Heat Transfer to Supercritical Cryogenic Hydrogen.

Abstract : Past interest in hydrogen as an energy-rich fuel for rocket propulsion lead to the design and construction of a comprehensive test rig at ERDE for experimental studies of the heat transfer characteristics of supercritical hydrogen. The completion of the construction and, of the first few tentative trials coincided with the Government's decision to terminate all R and D in this field. In view of the considerable effort expended on this project and some hopeful signs of revival of interest in hydrogen as a fuel, although for different applications, the available information up to the point of termination was compiled in this Technical Note. It contains a detailed description of the flow cycle of the rig, the details of construction and instrumentation of the electrically heated, square test section and all other associated instrumentation. In view of the hazards involved in experimenting with this fluid, special attention was paid to the development of automatic control and alarm devices. Brief reference is made to a few tentative trails to prove the proper functioning of all parts of the complex equipment.