I joined University of Glasgow Rocketry (GUR) during my year abroad, joining up with the Propulsion team. With my strong background in chemistry, experience as a club leader at Jet Engine Team at University of Denver (DUJET), and proficient coding skills, I was able to cleanly integrate into the existing culture.

I designed a program that automates Rocket Propulsion Analysis (RPA), allowing for teammates and the club to optimize rocket engine designs. Before my program, a user would have to repeatedly insert different variables into RPA to determine the effect of those variables on the engine. My program automatically inserts combinations of variables and collects the relevant data from RPA, and presents the data in a easily digestable format. 

My work focused on optimizing the cooling channel geometry of the combustion chamber. The Propulsion team decided to used regenerative cooling channels, which routed the cold liquid oxygen through the combustion chamber walls before igniting it, reducing the thermal stress inside of the combustion chamber. 

The channel width and channel height can be independently modified at the chamber, throat, and exit of the combustion chamber. Additionally, the angle at which these cooling channels wrap around the combustion chamber can also be modified. After discussing with my team lead, I got a range of widths, heights, and channel angles that would be realistic. The combination of these variables resulted in over 8,000 unique combinations of cooling channel geometries, which were then chosen by their low pressure loss and their low combustion channel wall temperatures.

The image above shows the geometric configurations that optimize for the lowest coolant pressure drop and the lowest combustion chamber wall temperature. These findings reduced coolant pressure drop by 20% and reduced combustion chamber wall temperature by 15% over human-found geometric configurations. Below is the entire report for the engine, which includes my analysis.