Conformal Phenolic Impregnated Carbon Ablator Arcjet Testing, Ablation, and Thermal Response

A new conformal type of phenolic impregnated carbon ablator was manufactured by resin impregnation of carbon felt. Based on property measurements of the conformal material and the existing model for a standard, rigid phenolic impregnated carbon ablator, a midfidelity material response model for the conformal material was developed. The rigid and conformal materials were arcjet tested simultaneously on a sphere-cone geometry in several environments with frustum heat flux up to . Good agreement between the predictions and data was obtained for recession, surface temperature, and in-depth temperatures. The conformal material has a slightly greater ablation rate but significantly lower thermal diffusivity than the rigid material.