Providing Next Generation Hypersonic Design and Analysis Tools
The Hypersonic Environment Analysis Tool, or HEAT, is the next generation tool for analyzing high speed flow environments of hypersonic thermal protection systems as well as many other applications. Building on the legacy of the Aeroheating and Thermal Analysis Code (ATAC), HEAT continues to serve a critical role in rapid modeling and design analysis by modeling TPS performance throughout entire trajectories in a fraction of the time required for high-fidelity CFD analysis.
HEAT is a modern, modular code that is developed using today’s best practices in software development. The code base has gone through multiple refactoring cycles, with extensive testing throughout its development. Tests are conducted nightly on the master branch of the code, and unit tests are conducted before merging branches using automated continuous integration pipelines. The modular form of the code has enabled parallelism of core components and the development of application programming interfaces (APIs) for core components and top-level drivers. In addition to the modernization progression, many improvements to the algorithms and numerical implementation of the material recession and shape change modules have resulted in improved stability and reliability of model predictions relative to legacy implementations. HEAT is available for distribution on both Linux and Windows platforms.
Features
- Preprocessing of unstructured and structured grids
- Inviscid flow modeling along streamlines
- Boundary Layer modeling along streamlines
- Charring material thermal response and ablation model
- Surface material shape change due to ablation and particle impact erosion
- Material damage response models to hydrometeor impacts
- Simplified hydrometeor distribution models
- 3DOF ballistic trajectory model
- Atmospheric table database
- Top level APIs for direct coupling with HEAT core functionality
- Fortran utility libraries
Applications
- Hypersonic thermal protection system (TPS) performance analysis
- Rapid trajectory analysis
- Rapid TPS Design evaluation for optimization
- Surface temperature calculation for signature analysis
- High speed system weather effects modeling
- Seeker dome/window material performance analysis
