Annotation: Specialized design office for liquid engines was established on July 22, 1958 to develop engines and propulsion systems, powered by liquid propellants to be installed on the combat missile systems and integrated launch vehicles (LV), developed by Yuzhnoye SDO. Moreover, liquid engines design office was assigned with manufacturing and testing of the main rocket engines, developed by NPO Energomash and to be installed on Yuzhnoye-developed launch vehicles. Over the past 66 years Yuzhnoye SDO has developed more than 40 liquid rocket engines (LRE) of various purpose, designed both to gas-generator cycle and to staged combustion cycle. Seventeen of them were commercially produced by Yuzhmash PA and installed on launch vehicles. Nowadays Yuzhnoye propulsion experts keep working on development of the advanced liquid rocket engines powered both by cryogenic and hypergolic propellants, which satisfy the majority of launch service market demands. Within the framework of extensive cooperation with foreign space companies, on a contract basis, Yuzhnoye propulsion experts are working on the design and development testing of the liquid rocket engines, as well as their components. The accumulated vast experience in the development of liquid rocket engines nowadays enables high scientific and technical level in the creation of up-to-date engines, demanded in the world market. Significant steps in this area have been made by the experts from the Yuzhnoye propulsion division and then subsequent manufacture and delivery by Yuzhmash PA of the engine intended for the European rocket Vega Stage 4; and designing the individual components for the engines with thrusts ranging from 500 kgf to 200 tf ordered by foreign customers. This article provides the review of current and scheduled activities of the Yuzhnoye SDO to develop the liquid rocket engines within the thrust ranges from ~ 40 kgf to ~ 500 tf.

Annotation: The high demands for the flow rate and thrust characteristics specified for the modern solid-propellant rocket motors (SRM) under the strict mass and overall dimensions constraints require high level of mass fraction of propellant. And in the process of propellant grain combustion, erosive burning often takes place (increase of propellant burning rate depending on combustion products flow rate along the grain channel). This may play both negative (off-design increase of chamber pressure) and positive role (for example, increasing the launch thrust-to-weight ratio of the rocket). It is typical of the main SRMs of various rocket systems (multiple launch rocket systems, anti-aircraft guided missiles, tactical missiles, boosters). This paper proposes a methodology for calculating the internal ballistic characteristics of a solid propellant rocket motor under erosive burning, which is relatively time and resource consuming. The methodology is based on equidistant model of propellant grain combustion, where grain is divided lengthwise into a number of intervals. For any point of time during the engine operation, burning area and port area of each interval are calculated, taking into account erosive impact on each interval; total burning area is the sum of all intervals burning areas. Gas flow rate in each interval of the grain channel is calculated using gas-dynamic equations. The motor mass flow rate is a mass input sum of all the intervals; and the burning rate in each interval is estimated with proper erosion factor. The combustion chamber pressure had been calculated for four erosive burning models proposed by different authors. All the models showed convergence with the experimental SRM test data sufficient for engineering estimate (in particular, for maximum chamber pressure and combustion time). Selected as a result erosive burning model may be used to design new motors with solid propellants similar in chemical composition, and the model parameters are to be further customized using the test specimens.

Annotation: The main solid rocket motors of surface-to-air missiles and some short-range missiles have, as a rule, two operation modes – starting (augmented rating) and cruise (with decreased propellant consumption level). The methods to calculate intraballistic characteristics of such motors have a number of peculiarities, which set them apart from the methods of determining the characteristics of motors with constant propellant consumption level. The purpose of this article is to analyze such peculiarities, design methods, to find interrelation between the parameters of propellant consumption diagram, to determine the impact on the latter of motor design features and propellant characteristics. To achieve this goal, the method of analytical dependencies was developed. The equations obtained show that the required parameters of diagrams (including consumption-thrust characteristics difference between the starting and cruise modes) can be ensured due to varying either case diameter or propellant combustion rate or due to combined variation of these values. In practice, the cases are possible when for some reasons it does not seem possible to vary the case diameter or propellant combustion rate and the requirements to consumption diagram cannot be satisfied to the full extent. The task of motor developer in that case consists in determination of acceptable (alternative) propellant consumption diagrams that would be closest to required. The proposed method is based on calculation and construction of nomograms of dependencies of relative propellant consumption in cruse mode on relative time of starting leg at different propellant combustion rates and constant (required) case diameter and vice versa, at different values of case diameter and constant (available) propellant combustion rate. Using these nomograms, the rocket developer can determine the propellant consumption diagram acceptable for the rocket. In a number of cases, design limitations for separate main motor assemblies are imposed on consumption characteristic diagram that have an impact on its required parameters. The presented materials allow evaluating that impact and contain the proposals to remove it. The presented method allows quickly determining the conditions needed to fulfill required propellant combustion products consumption diagrams and in case of nonfulfillment of these conditions – allow presenting alternative options for selection of most acceptable one.

Annotation: The possibility is considered of using rocket propellant thermal neutralization units for decontamination of dangerous industrial wastes. The advantages of thermal neutralization units are considered, their operating principle is described, by the example of high-temperature toxic rocket propellants, the chemical reactions that take place in combustion chamber are formulated. The combustion chamber is a component of the neu tralization unit, it is in the combustion chamber, in the environment of created high temperatures, that the process of elimination of dangerous substances takes place. Taking into consideration the high cost of neutralization units, which will be a factor hindering the wide-scale introduction of neutralization units to decrease technogenic load on environment of Ukraine, the option is proposed of reducing the costs during the use of thermal neutralization units by way of combining the function of oxidizer neutralization unit and fuel neutralization unit in a single universal neutralization unit. The article substantiates the topicality and necessity of works to create the universal thermal neutralization unit from the viewpoint of economic and ecological aspects. The article presents a generalized description of technology and methodology of research tests of pilot samples of assemblies for high-temperature rocket propellants vapor and industrial wastewater supply into the neutralization unit. The assemblies for high-temperature rocket propellants vapor and industrial wastewater supply are considered as most critical components of the universal neutralization unit from the viewpoint of neutralized substance changing. The experiments were conducted on water solutions of rocket propellants that in this case simulated the contact of internal cavities of supply assemblies with aggressive toxic media. The conditions were created at which the probability existed of interaction of rocket propellants residues in stagnation zones at the moment of changing the supplied propellant component. In the frameworks of research tests of pilot samples, the obtained results were considered and analyzed. The findings are presented that confirm practical feasibility of using integrated supply assemblies.