A Pulsed Plasma Thruster Based on Capillary Discharge

Abstract

The invention relates to a pulse plasma thruster based on capillary discharging. The pulse plasma thruster comprises a power supply processing unit, a main capacitor, a semiconductor sparking plug, an ignition circuit, a main discharging circuit, a propellant working medium, a cathode nozzle, an anode and an organic glass shell. According to the pulse plasma thruster, through introducing the cathode nozzle, main discharging current and the moving direction of plasma form certain angle, and electromagnetic acceleration is introduced under the function of a self-inductance magnetic field. Different from the traditional electromagnetic acceleration type pulse plasma thruster, the pulse plasma thruster based on capillary discharging fully utilizes an electric heating acceleration mechanism to improve the energy utilization efficiency, can improve the overall efficiency of a system under the low-power level, and is particularly suitable for the low-power application site of a microsatellite.

Description

technical field [0001] The disclosure belongs to the field of pulse power technology and power machinery technology, and relates to a pulse plasma thruster based on capillary discharge. Background technique [0002] 1. Traditional cold air propulsion and chemical propulsion systems need to use propellant storage devices and supply systems, which makes the overall mass of the device large and the structure complex. At the same time, the above two propulsion systems have small specific impulse and low efficiency, which largely limits their space applications in microsatellites. Since the former Soviet Union first applied the pulsed plasma thruster to the Zond 2 aircraft in the 1960s, as a new type of electric propulsion system, the pulsed plasma thruster has been greatly developed. And with the expansion of the micro-satellite application market, pulsed plasma thrusters have a wide range of applications in micro-satellites performing high-precision tasks due to their advantag...

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Problems solved by technology

[0003] 2. The traditional pulse plasma thruster adopts the electromagnetic acceleration mechanism, and the energy storage capacitor is connected through two parallel electrode plates, and the propellant is placed between the two plates.

[0004] 3. Although the electromagnetic pulse plasma thruster uses a solid propellant, the propellant working fluid and the thruster body are combined to form a modular device, but because the electromagnetic force can only accelerate charged particles, it has little effect on the acceleration of neutral molecules

Experiments have shown that the mass of neutral molecules produced by ablation accounts for 70% to 90% of the total ablation product mass, which makes the acceleration efficiency of the pulsed plasma thruster low and affects the overall energy conversion efficiency of the thruster

At the same time, due to the existence of the hysteresis ablation phenomenon and the particle emission effect, the utilization rate of the working medium is low, and there are still great obstacles to the wide application on small power level micro-satellites

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