Instrumentation for flow calibration and vehicle measurements in hypervelocity flows in the LENS facility

A review is presented of the instrumentation employed in the LENS facility to obtain measurements of flow field quality, the aerothermal characteristics of hypervelocity vehicles, the aero-optic performance of seekerheads and the operational performance of hydrogen-powered scramjet configurations. The basic design and operation of the LENS tunnel is briefly reviewed. Intrusive and non-intrusive instrumentation which are being employed to measure the distribution of properties in the exit plane of the nozzle and over hypervelocity vehicle configurations are described. The surface heat transfer, pressure and skin friction instrumentation which are routinely employed to define the aerothermal properties of hypersonic vehicles are discussed. The aero-optical instrumentation suite which has been developed specifically for the LENS facility to measure seekerhead performance is discussed in detail. Finally, we present instrumentation which will be used to measure the performance of hypersonic scramjet combustion in the LENS facility at velocities from 6000 ft/sec to 15000 ft/sec.