Hypersonic vehicles are exposed to severe heating loads during their flight in the atmosphere. In order to minimize the heating problem, a variety of cooling techniques are presently available for hypersonic blunt bodies. Introduction of a forward-facing cavity in the nose tip of a blunt body configuration of hypersonic vehicle is one of the most simple and attractive methods of reducing the convective heating rates on such a vehicle. In addition to aerodynamic heating, the overall drag force experienced by vehicles flying at hypersonic speeds is predominate due to formation of strong shock waves in the flow. Hence, the effective management of heat transfer rate and aerodynamic drag is a primary element to the success of any hypersonic vehicle design. So, precise information on both aerodynamic forces and heat transfer rates are essential in deciding the performance of the vehicle. In order to address the issue of both forces and heat transfer rates, right kind of measurement techniques must be incorporated in the ground-based testing facilities for such type of body configurations. Impulse facilities are the only devices that can simulate high altitude flight conditions. Uncertainties in test flow conditions of impulse facilities are some of the critical issues that essentially affect the final experimental results. Hence, more reliable and carefully designed experimental techniques/methodologies are needed in impulse facilities for generating experimental data, especially at hypersonic Mach numbers. In view of the above, an experimental program has been initiated to develop novel techniques of measuring both the aerodynamic forces and surface heat transfer rates. In the present investigation, both aerodynamic forces and surface heat transfer rates are measured over the test models at hypersonic Mach numbers in IISc hypersonic shock tunnel HST-2, having an effective test time of 800 s. The aerodynamic coefficients are measured with a miniature type accelerometer based balance system where as platinum thin film sensors are used to measure the convective heat transfer rates over the surface of the test model. An internally mountable accelerometer based balance system (three and six-component) is used for the measurement of aerodynamic forces and moment coefficients acting on the different test models (i.e., blunt cone with after body, blunt cone with after body and frustum, blunt cone with after body-frustum-triangular fins and sharp cone with after body-frustum-triangular fins), flying at free stream Mach numbers of 5.75 and 8 in hypersonic shock tunnel. The main principle of this design is that the model along with the internally mounted accelerometer balance system are supported by rubber bushes and there-by ensuring unrestrained free floating conditions of the model in the test section during the flow duration. In order to get a better performance from the accelerometer balance system, the location of accelerometers plays a vital role during the initial design of the balance. Hence, axi-symmetric finite element modeling (FEM) of the integrated model-balance system for the missile shaped model has been carried out at 0° angle of attack in a flow Mach number of 8. The drag force of a model was determined using commercial package of MSC/NASTRAN and MSC/PATRAN. For test flow duration of 800 s, the neoprene type rubber with Young’s modulus of 3 MPa and material combinations (aluminum and stainless steel material used as the model and balance) were chosen. The simulated drag acceleration (finite element) from the drag accelerometer is compared with recorded acceleration-time history from the accelerometer during the shock tunnel testing. The agreement between the acceleration-time history from finite-element simulation and measured response from the accelerometer is very good within the test flow domain. In order to verify the performance of the balance, tests were carried out on similar standard AGARD model configurations (blunt cone with cylinder and blunt cone with cylinder-frustum) and the results indicated that the measured values match very well with the AGARD model data and theoretically estimated values. Modified Newtonian theory is used to calculate the aerodynamic force coefficient analytically for various angles of attack. Convective surface heat transfer rate measurements are carried out by using vacuum sputtered platinum thin film sensors deposited on ceramic substrate (Macor) inserts which in turn are embedded on the metallic missile shaped body. Investigations are carried out on a model with and without fin configurations in HST-2 at flow Mach number of 5.75 and 8 with a stagnation enthalpy of 2 MJ/kg for zero degree angle of attack. The measured heating rates for the missile shaped body (i.e., with fin configuration) are lower than the predicted stagnation heating rates (Fay-Riddell expression) and the maximum difference is about 8%. These differences may be due to the theoretical values of velocity gradient used in the empirical relation. The experimentally measured values are expressed in terms of normalized heat transfer rates, Stanton numbers and correlated Stanton numbers, compared with the numerically estimated results. From the results, it is inferred that the location of maximum heating occurs at stagnation point which corresponds to zero velocity gradient. The heat-transfer ratio (q1/Qo)remains same in the stagnation zone of the model when the Mach number is increased from 5.75 to 8. At the corners of the blunt cone, the heat transfer rate doesn’t increase (or) fluctuate and the effects are negligible at two different Mach numbers (5.75 and 8). On the basis of equivalent total enthalpy, the heat-transfer rate with fin configuration (i.e., at junction of cylinder and fins) is slightly higher than that of the missile model without fin. Attempts have also been made to evaluate the feasibility of using forward facing cavity as probable technique to reduce the heat transfer rate and to study its effect on aerodynamic coefficients on a 41° apex angle missile shaped body, in hypersonic shock tunnel at a free stream Mach number of 8. The forward-facing circular cavities with two different diameters of 6 and 12 mm are chosen for the present investigations. Experiments are carried out at zero degree angle of attack for heat transfer measurements. About 10-25 % reduction in heat transfer rates is observed with cavity at gauge locations close to stagnation region, whereas the reduction in surface heat transfer rate is between 10-15 % for all other gauge locations (which is slightly downstream of the cavity) compared with the model without cavity. In order to understand the influence of forward facing cavities on force coefficients, measurement of aerodynamic forces and moment coefficients are also carried out on a missile shaped body at angles of attack. The same six component balance is also being used for subsequent investigation of force measurement on a missile shaped body with forward facing cavity. Overall drag reductions of up to 5 % is obtained for a cavity of 6 mm diameter, where as, for the 12 mm cavity an increase in aerodynamic drag is observed (up to about 10%). The addition of cavity resulted in a slight increase in the missile L/D ratio and did not significantly affect the missile lateral components. In summary, the designed balances are found to be suitable for force measurements on different test models in flows of duration less than a millisecond. In order to compliment the experimental results, axi-symmetric, Navier-Stokes CFD computations for the above-defined models are carried out for various angles of attack using a commercial package CFX-Ansys 5.7. The experimental free stream conditions obtained from the shock tunnel are used for the boundary conditions in the CFD simulation. The fundamental aerodynamic coefficients and heat transfer rates of experimental results are shown to be in good agreement with the predicted CFD. In order to have a feeling of the shock structure over test models, flow visualization experiments have been carried out by using the Schlieren technique at flow Mach numbers of 5.75 and 8. The visualized shock wave pattern around the test model consists of a strong bow shock which is spherical in shape and symmetrical over the forebody of the cone. Experimentally measured shock stand-off distance compare well with the computed value as well as the theoretically estimated value using Van Dyke’s theory. These flow visualization experiments have given a factual proof to the quality of flow in the tunnel test section.