A parametric study on the design factors influencing the thermal performance of nickel alloy C263 sandwich panels

ABSTRACT

To protect the airframe and the payload of hypersonic cruise vehicles from aerothermal heating and aerodynamic loading, metallic thermal protection systems (MTPS) are intended to be used. MTPS are composite structures containing a combination of insulating material and two sandwich panels placed on top and bottom of it. There are numerous design factors influencing the (a) thermal performance and (b) density of these sandwich panels (SP). In the current study, the effect of six important geometric design parameters of nickel alloy C263 sandwich panel viz., (A) core cell shape, (B) core cell size, (C) core cell height (D) core sheet thickness, (E) top and (F) bottom face sheet thickness were evaluated and analysed using Taguchi-based design of experiments (DOE) approach. The results obtained were analysed using standard statistical analysis techniques in order to identify the optimum combination of design parameters and to ascertain the influence of each aforementioned design parameters on the performance of C263 sandwich panels. Further, the optimum combination of sandwich-panel design parameters that provides the best thermal performance with lowest density has been identified using an algebraic model and validated. The results obtained are presented and discussed here.

KEYWORDS:

• Thermal protection system
• C263
• sandwich panels
• Taguchi method
• ANOM;ANOVA

Nomenclature

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Acknowledgments

The authors thank Dr. G Madhusudhan Reddy, Director, DMRL for permitting and encouraging to publish this work. Funding provided by Defence Research and Development Organization (DRDO) for the work is acknowledged.

Data Availability Statement

The authors confirm that the data supporting the findings of this study are available within the article. Any further information can be obtained from the corresponding author, I. Balasundar (email: [email protected]), upon request.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

T. Mahender

Mr. T Mahender received his B.Tech (Mechanical Engg.) from GEC College and M.Tech (Thermal Engg.) from JNTUH, Hyderabad in 2013. Currently, he is pursuing his Ph.D in the Dept. of Mechanical Engg. at JNTUH, Hyderabad. His research interest include: Thermal protection system; Thermo-mechanical processing; Finite element analysis; Optimization; Sheet metal forming.

I. Balasundar

Dr. I. Balasundar  received his Bachelor's degree in Metallurgical Engineering from GCE, Salem, Tamilnadu, and Ph.D in Metallurgical Engineering and Materials science from IIT Bombay, India. His research interests includes high temperature deformation processing of materials, process modeling, finite-element anaysis, severe plastic deformation and structure property correlations.

T. Raghu

Dr. T. Raghu obtained his Bachelor's degree in Metallurgical Engineering from NIT Durgapur and subsequently obtained his Master's and Ph.D from IIT Bombay. He is associated with various programs on material processing and development of product technologies for high temperature materials.