th AIAA Fluid Dynamics Conference

Detailed measurements of aerodynamic heating rates in the wake of a Mars-Pathfinder configuration model have been made. Heating data were obtained in a conventional wind tunnel, the NASA LaRC 31" Mach 10 Air Tunnel, and in a high-enthalpy impulse facility, the NASA HYPULSE expansion tube, in which air and CO 2 were employed as test gases. The enthalpy levels were 0.7 MJ/kg in the Mach 10 Tunnel, 12 MJ/kg at Mach 9.8 for HYPULSE CO 2 tests and 14 MJ/kg at Mach 7.9 for HYPULSE air tests. Wake heating rates were also measured on three similar parametric configurations, and forebody heating measurements were made in order to facilitate CFD comparisons. The ratio of peak wake heating to forebody stagnation point heating in the Mach 10 Tunnel varied from 7% to 15% depending on the freestream Reynolds number. In HYPULSE, the ratio was ~5% for both air and CO 2 . It was observed that an increase in the ratio of forebody corner radius to nose radius resulted in a decrease in peak wake heating, ..