A Discontinuous Galerkin–Finite Element Method for the Nonlinear Unsteady Burning Rate Responses of Solid Propellants

Abstract

The unsteady combustion of solid propellants under oscillating environments is the key to understanding the combustion instability inside solid rocket motors. The discontinuous Galerkin–finite element method (DG-FEM) is introduced to provide an efficient yet flexible numerical platform to investigate the combustion dynamics of solid propellants. The algorithm is developed for the classical unsteady model, the Zel’dovich–Novozhilov model. It is then validated based on a special analytical solution. The DG-FEM algorithm is then compared with the classical spectral method based on Laguerre polynomials. It is shown that the DG-FEM works more efficiently than the traditional spectral method, providing a more accurate solution with a lower computational cost.

Keywords

• discontinuous Galerkin
• numerical algorithm
• solid propellant
• unsteady response
• combustion instability