Abstract:

To accurately control the flow rate of liquid hydrogen and oxygen in liquid-fuel rocket engine，Venturi is commonly used.A CFD study on cavitation of liquid oxygen in Venturi was conducted，taking into consideration the thermal effect on the assumption about liquid-vapor thermal balance.The numerical model comprised homogeneous multiphase model on the basis of Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes equations and the full cavitation model.Computational results about the pressure and temperature distributions along the cavitating hydrofoil were then compared to the experimental data of NASA to validate the model.Detailed analysis on cavitation characteristics included the pressure，temperature and cavitation intensity profile along the hydrofoil wall，the impact of inlet-outlet pressure ratio on cavitation and the mechanism of maintaining cavitation in cryogenic fluids.The numerical results of this paper can be used to guide liquid-oxygen-Venturi design.