The pulsed inductive thruster (PIT) is an electrodeless plasma accelerator employing a large (1m diameter) spiral coil energized by a capacitor bank discharge. The bank can be repetitively recharged by a nuclear electric generator for continuous MW level operation. The coil can be designed as a transformer that permits thruster operation at the generator voltage, which results in a low thruster specific mass. Specific impulse (Isp) can be readily altered by changing the propellant valve plenum pressure. Performance curves generated from mesausred impulse, injected mass and capacitor bank energy are presented for argon, ammonia, hydrazine, carbon dioxide and helium. The highest performance measured to date is 48% efficiency at 4000 seconds Isp with ammonia. The development of a theoretical model of the thruster, which assumes a fully ionized plasma, is presented in an appendix.


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    Title :

    Pulsed inductive thruster performance data base for megawatt‐class engine applications


    Contributors:

    Conference:

    10th SymposiumùSpace Nuclear Power and Propulsion ; 1993 ; Albuquerque, NM, USA


    Published in:

    AIP Conference Proceedings ; 271 , 3 ; 1425-1434


    Publication date :

    1993-01-20


    Size :

    10 pages





    Type of media :

    Conference paper


    Type of material :

    Electronic Resource


    Language :

    English






    Status of Pulsed Inductive Thruster Research

    Hrbud, I. / LaPointe, M. / Vondra, R. et al. | British Library Conference Proceedings | 2002