Longitudinal Static and Dynamic Stability of a Biconic Reentry Body in Subsonic Mach Number Using CFD

Reentry from orbit is a critical phase in the entry trajectory. For a non-propulsive ballistic entry, static and dynamic stability plays an important role in the trajectory, especially for the safe deployment of parachutes, typically at high subsonic Mach numbers. Static stability of flight vehicles is being estimated through empirical methods, CFD and experiments. Longitudinal static and dynamic stability of a typical reentry body for subsonic Mach number of 0.6 is predicted using commercial software CFD +  + and presented here. Steady state simulations are carried out for low angle of attack at α = 0 and 2° on an unstructured grid using SST k-ω model. Transient simulation using forced oscillation method is used to compute pitch damping derivatives. Results for transient simulations are validated against test data.