UNIT II AERODYNAMICS OF ROCKETS AND MISSILES

Airframe components of rockets and missiles – Forces acting on a missile while passing
through atmosphere – Slender body aerodynamics – Method of describing forces and
moments – Lift force and lateral moment – Drag estimation – Upwash and downwash in
missile bodies – Rocket dispersion.

Airframe components of rockets and missiles:

The body of the missile may be divided into three major sections
1. the forebody or the nose,
2. the mid-section and
3. the aft or boat-tail section

Figure: Sections of missile

1. Nose Section
Forebodies may have many varieties of shapes, most common of which
are conical, ogival, power series or hemispherical. These shapes are used
primarily on the missiles of supersonic speeds and are generally selected on the
basis of combined aerodynamic, guidance and structural considerations.
A hemispherical nose has very high drag from the aerodynamic drag or
performance standpoint, but it is excellent from the standpoint of structural
integrity, resistance to aerodynamic heating and amenability to certain types of
guidance like infrared guidance.
The supersonic flow over a cone has characteristics which are similar in
appearance as that of a conical one but are markedly different in nature from
those corresponding to two-dimensional flow (i.e., flow over a wedge). The
similarity in appearance is that an oblique shock wave is formed at the tip of the
wedge and apex of the cone.

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 An ogive is similar to a cone except that the plan form shape is formed by
an arc of a circle instead of a straight line as is evident from below figure. The
ogival shape has several advantages over the conical section.
These are:
1. Slightly greater volume for a given base and length.
2. A blunter nose providing structural superiority.
3. Slightly lower drag.

Figure: Conical and ogival nose cone shapes

The hemispherical forebody type of nose is more widely used particularly in

missiles which use infrared (IR) seekers as their homing head. 'The ease of manufacture
of this shape is one of the major reasons and advantages for its use in spite of its
extremely high drag penalty on the missile.

2. Mid-Section
The mid-section in most missile configurations is cylindrical in shape. This
shape is advantageous from the standpoint of drag, ease of manufacturing and load
carrying capability.
The effects of mid-section or afterbody extension on the aerodynamic
characteristics of the conical and ogival nose bodies have been investigatted and it is
seen that the effect of afterbody extension is to increase the lift coefficient and move
the centre of pressure toward aft end as a result of body carry over and viscous
cross-flow effects.

3. Boat-tail Section

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 Boat tail is the tapered portion of the aft section of a body. The purpose of the
boat-tail is to decrease the drag of a body which has a 'squared off base’. By 'boat-
tailing' the rear portion of the body, the base area is reduced and thus a decrease in
base drag is realized. However, the decrease in base drag may be partially nullified
by the boat tail-drag.
Some generalizations may be made:
1. The drag of the body at supersonic speeds depends primarily on the
nose shape and the amount of boat tailing.
2. Base drag is greatly affected by the presence of the jet.
3. The majority of the body lift is on the nose section of the body with a
small down load on the boat-tail.
4. The resultant centre of pressure for a conventional body varies between
15 and 20 per cent of the body length at low angles of attack.
5. At higher angles of attack the centre of pressure of the complete body
can move forward or aft of the nominaI centre of pressure location
depending on the amount of boat-tailing.
6. For moderate boat tailing, say seven degree, the centre of pressure tends
to shift rearward with angle of attack.
7. The nose may be rounded off to lower radii without causing any drag
penalty.

WING DESIGN
A major important item in the aerodynamic missile configuration is the wing
or the main lifting surface. A great variety of wing planforms or configurations are
used. A straight wing planform is the one which is often used. Two other basic wing
planforms used are delta and swept back wings. There are many variations of basic
planforms are shown in Fig.

In general, sharp nosed symmetrical airfoil sections of the double wedge,

modified double-wedge, or biconvex variety shown in the Fig.

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 The final selection of airfoil shape, one must consider the structural efficiency
and manufacturing cost as well as its aerodynamic efficiency. The double wedge has
the lowest drag for a given thickness ratio, whereas the biconvex section has the
lowest drag per unit strength. From the manufacturing standpoint the modified
double wedge is preferred, where solid sections are involved.
The sharp leading and trailing edges may have to be rounded to provide local
structural integrity as well as to minimize the aerodynamic heating effects.
Generally speaking, the biconvex should be used on large wings which are not solid
sections and modified double wedge should be used for smaller sized solid wings.
Finally, the size and area of the wing of a missile may be dictated by
considerations of range and maneuverability requirements, types of design and
compatibility with subsystem operation.

Drag Estimation
Drag force is the summation of all forces that resist against aircraft motion. The
calculation of the drag of a complete aircraft is a difficult and challenging task, even for
the simplest configurations. We will consider the separate sources of drag that
contribute to the total drag of an aircraft.

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 Figure 1: Different types of Drag

1. Induced Drag:
The induced drag is the drag directly associated with the production of lift. This
results from the dependency of the induced drag on the angle of attack. As the angle of
attack of the aircraft (i.e., lift coefficient) varies, this type of drag is changed. The
induced drag in itself consists of two parts. The first part originates from vortices
around wing, tail, fuselage, and other components. The second part is because of air
compressibility effect. In low subsonic flight, it is negligible, but is high subsonic and
transonic flight, must be taken into account.

About 80% of the induced drag comes from wing; about 10% comes from tail;
and the rest originate from other components. The induced drag is a function of
airspeed, air density, reference area, and the lift coefficient:

In this equation, the coefficient CDi is called induced drag coefficient. As the
airspeed increases, the induced drag decreases; so the induced drag is inversely a
function of airspeed.

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 Figure 2: Airspeed versus Di

2. Parasite Drag:
The total drag of an airplane minus the induced drag. Thus, it is the drag not
directly associated with the production of lift. The parasite drag is composed of drag of
various aerodynamic components; the definitions of which follow.

3. Skin Friction Drag:

The drag on a body resulting from viscous shearing stresses (i.e., friction) over
its contact surface (i.e., skin). The drag of a very streamlined shape such as a thin, flat
plate is frequently expressed in terms of a skin friction drag. This drag is a function of
Reynolds number.
There are mainly two cases where the flow in the boundary layer is entirely
laminar or entirely turbulent over the plate. The Reynolds number is based on the total
length of the object in the direction of the velocity. In a usual application, the boundary
layer is normally laminar near the leading edge of the object undergoing transition to a
turbulent layer at some distance back along the surface.
The distance, from the leading edge of the object to the transition point can be
calculated from the transition Reynolds number. Skin friction factor is independent of
surface roughness in laminar flow, but is a strong function of surface roughness in
turbulent flow due to boundary layer.

4. Form Drag (sometimes called Pressure Drag):

The drag on a body resulting from the integrated effect of the static pressure
acting normal to its surface resolved in the drag direction. Unlike the skin friction drag
that results from viscous shearing forces tangential to a body’s surface, form drag
results from the distribution of pressure normal to the body’s surface.
In an extreme case of a flat plate normal to the flow, the drag is totally the result
of an imbalance in the pressure distribution. As with skin friction drag, form drag is
generally dependent on Reynolds number. Form drag is based on the projected frontal
area.

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 5. Interference Drag:
The increment in drag resulting from bringing two bodies in proximity to each
other. For example, the total drag of a wing-fuselage combination will usually be
greater than the sum of the wing drag and fuselage drag independent of each other.

6. Trim Drag:
The increment in drag resulting from the (tail) aerodynamic forces required to
trim the aircraft about its center of gravity. Trim drag usually is a form of induced and
form drag on the horizontal tail.

7. Profile Drag:
Usually taken to mean the total of the skin friction drag and form drag for a
two-dimensional airfoil section.

8. Cooling Drag:
The drag resulting from the momentum lost by the air that passes through the
power plant installation for the purpose of cooling the engine.

9. Wave Drag:
In supersonic airspeeds, a new type of drag is produced and it is referred to as
“shock wave drag” or simply “wave drag”. When a supersonic flow experiences an
obstacle (e.g., wing leading edge or fuselage nose); it is turned into itself and a shock
wave is formed.
A shock wave is a thin sheet of air across which abrupt changes occur in flow
parameters such as pressure, temperature, density, speed, and Mach number. In
general, air flowing through a shock wave experiences a jump toward higher density,
higher pressure, higher temperature, and lower Mach number. The effective Mach
number approaching the shock wave is the Mach number of the component of velocity
normal to the shock wave. This component Mach number must be greater than 1.0 for a
shock to exist. The wave drag; the new source of drag; is inherently related to the loss
of the stagnation pressure and increase of entropy across the oblique and normal shock
waves. In supersonic speed, the drag coefficient is expressed by:

Where CDw is referred to as "wave drag coefficient”. The precise calculation of

CDw is time consuming, but to give the reader the guidance, we present two techniques,
one for a lifting surface leading edge; and one for the whole aircraft.