Hypersonic rarefied flow over sharp slender cones

Drag, heat transfer, and number flux were measured on sharp cones in the near free, molecule flow regime, and the results were compared with available Monte Carlo calculations. In general, the calculations predicted the magnitude of the data; however, the heat transfer and drag increased with increasing Knudsen number at a faster rate than predicted. Also the drag coefficients measured for the slender cones at high Knudsen number were higher than predicted for free molecule flow. These disagreements between theory and experiment could possibly be attributed to the simplicity of the surface interaction laws assumed in the theory. Reynolds analogy factors obtained from the experimental measurements agreed with free-molecule values and also with that obtained by the Monte Carlo technique.