The prediction of the propellant behaviour in tank systems over the entire duration of a mission is of vital importance for the design of cryogenic tank systems for upper stages. For this, effects such as stratification, evaporation, condensation, boiling, two-phase flow, propellant slosh by itself but also coupled with heat and mass transfer phenomena, as well as processes such as filling, draining, pressurization and de-pressurization must be taken into consideration.
The department of transport and propulsion systems uses commercial CFD tools such as FLOW-3D for the calculation of flow phenomena, and is developing its own solutions for specific issues using the Open Source Code OpenFOAM.
CFD model (OpenFOAM) for the propellant behaviour within a tank system