Radiometric investigation of the wake flow of the forthcoming Aeroassist Flight Experiment

This paper describes the rationale for conducting the proposed radiation measurement in the afterbody region of the Aeroassist Flight Experiment (AFE) vehicle, the results of the calculations of expected radiation intensities performed to date, and the instrumentation for the measurement. The experiment, named the Afterbody Radiometry Experiment (ARE), is one of the experiments that will be carried on board the AFE vehicle. The paper collates the existing experimental data to show the possibility that there may be substantial radiative heating of the afterbody region of an Aeroassisted Space Transfer Vehicle, which necessitates an experiment of the kind proposed. Calculations of the radiative heating rate to the base of the AFE are, qualitatively, in fair agreement with previous experimental work, which indicated that the radiative heating of the base is about 5 percent of that at the stagnation point.