The High Enthalpy Shock Tunnel in Goettingen

The high enthalpy shock tunnel in Goettingen (HEG) will be described.The tunnel in Goettingen is currently being established for work in the hypervelocity flow regime where dissociative effects of nitrogen are significant. This is a free piston driven shock tunnel operating in the reflected mode. In this paper, after a brief description of the facility and its operating requirements, the first commissioning results will be described. These show that conditions similar to atmospheric reentry conditions of a space flight vehicle, with specific stagnation enthalpie h &#61 20,corresponding to flight velocity v &#61 6.3 (or flight Mach number 21), have been achieved with test gas nitrogen