Published online by Cambridge University Press: 29 March 2006
An experimental investigation was undertaken of the flow produced by the inviscid expansion of air through a hypersonic nozzle. Stagnation enthalpy levels up to 4 × 107 J/kg were used, with initial dissociation levels approaching 90%. By measuring the flow velocity and the frozen dissociation fractions of oxygen and nitrogen, it was found that existing theoretical models served adequately to define the nozzle flow, at least for the purpose of conducting experiments involving reacting inviscid hypersonic flows about blunt bodies.