Effect of Bypass Mass Injection on Thrust Vectoring of a Supersonic Micro-Nozzle: A DSMC Investigation

Converging-diverging thrust-vectoring micro-nozzle has the potential to become a prominent manoeuvring technique of flight control for small-scale aerospace systems. Present study addresses thrust vectoring in the supersonic micro-nozzle by “bypass mass injection” method. Numerical modelling has been done by the direct simulation Monte Carlo (DSMC) method. Numerical results show that the total mass flow rate, secondary flow percentage, thrust force, thrust coefficient, and specific impulse increase with the bypass channel width. Consequently, a change in thrust direction is obtained which in turn produces a considerable vectoring effect in the supersonic micro-nozzle. The vectoring effect for Pout = 40 kPa peaks at 6-μm bypass channel, whereas a gradual increase of the vectoring angle with the bypass channel width is observed at Pout = 10 kPa.