An Overview of the Space Shuttle Aerothermodynamic Design

The Space Shuttle Thermal Protection System was one of the three areas that required the development of new technology. The talk discusses the pre-flight development of the aerothermodynamic environment which was based on Mach 8 wind tunnel data. A high level overview of the pre-flight heating rate predictions and comparison to the Orbiter Flight Test (OFT) data is presented, along with a discussion of the dramatic improvement in the state-of-the-art in aerothermodynamic capability that has been used to support the Shuttle Program. A high level review of the Orbiter aerothermodynamic design is discussed, along with improvements in Computational Fluid Dynamics and wind tunnel testing that was required for flight support during the last 30 years. The units have been removed from the plots, and the discussion is kept at a high level.