Rocket-Based Combined Cycle (RBCC) engines combine the best performance characteristics of air-breathing systems such as ramjets and scramjets with rockets with the goal of increasing payload/structure and propellant performance and thus making LEO more readily accessible. The idea of using RBCC engines for Single-Stage-To-Orbit (SSTO) trans-atmospheric acceleration is not new, but has been known for decades. Unfortunately, the availability of detailed models of RBCC engines is scarce. This thesis addresses the issue through the construction of an analytical performance model of an ejector rocket in a dual combustion propulsion system (ERIDANUS) RBCC engine. This performance model along with an atmospheric model, created using MATLAB was designed to be a preliminary `proof-of-concept' which provides details on the performance and behavior of an RBCC engine in the context of use during trans-atmospheric acceleration, and also to investigate the possibility of improving propellant performance above that of conventional rocket powered systems. ERIDANUS behaves as a thrust augmented rocket in low speed flight, as a ramjet in supersonic flight, a scramjet in hypersonic flight, and as a pure rocket near orbital speeds and altitudes. A simulation of the ERIDANUS RBCC engine's flight through the atmosphere in the presence of changing atmospheric conditions was performed. The performance code solves one-dimensional compressible flow equations while using the stream thrust control volume method at each station component (e.g. diffuser, burner, and nozzle) in all modes of operation to analyze the performance of the ERIDANUS RBCC engine. Plots of the performance metrics of interest including specific impulse, specific thrust, thrust specific fuel consumption, and overall efficiency were produced. These plots are used as a gage to measure the behavior of the ERIDANUS propulsion system as it accelerates towards LEO. A mission averaged specific impulse of 1080 seconds was calculated from the ERIDANUS code, reducing the required propellant mass to 65% of the gross lift off weight (GLOW), thus increasing the mass available for the payload and structure to 35% of the GLOW. Validation of the ERIDANUS RBCC concept was performed by comparing it with other known RBCC propulsion models. Good correlation exists between the ERIDANUS model and the other models. This indicates that the ERIDANUS RBCC is a viable candidate propulsion system for a one-stage trans-atmospheric accelerator.

Reservoir-type dispenser hollow cathodes are currently being developed for use on NASAs Prometheus 1 mission. In these cathodes, the reaction between a barium source material and tungsten powder contained in a cavity surrounding a porous tungsten emitter produces barium vapor which is crucial to operation of the cathode. The primary objective of this research was to investigate the reactions between tungsten and a commercial barium source material in a simulated reservoir hollow cath-ode environment. Mixtures of tungsten and a barium calcium aluminate material were sealed inside molybdenum capsules with porous tungsten closures and heated to 1000?1200?and 1300?or 100, 200, and 400 hours. Based on the reaction products, which were identified to be BaAl2O4 and Ba2CaWO6, a reaction was proposed for the barium calcium aluminate material with tungsten. The bottom pellets in the capsules were found to have reacted to a much further extent than the top pellets in all of the samples, possibly due to a temperature gradient or excessive moisture in the base of the capsules. Quantita-tive and semi-quantitative x-ray analysis results did not show a clear trend as to how the concentrations of BaAl2O4 and Ba2CaWO6 vary with time. Most of the barium source materials are hygroscopic, and hydration of the materi-als would substantially reduce the performance of the cathode. Therefore, the environ-mental stability of several barium compounds, 3BaO??2O3 (B3A), 6BaO????2O3 (612), 4BaO????O3 (411), Ba2.9Ca1.1Al2O7 (B4ASSL), and Ba3Sc4O9, were investi-gated in order to evaluate their suitability for use as barium source materials. A micro-balance was used to measure weight gain of the materials as they were exposed to dew points of ??C and 11?t room temperature. The results showed that B3A hydrated more extensively than any of the other materials tested in the low- and intermediate-humidity environments, while the 612, 411, and B4ASSL materials were all reasonably stable in the low-humidity environment. The Ba3Sc4O9 was extremely stable compared to the barium aluminates in the intermediate-humidity conditions.

This work focuses on improving the thrust-to-power ratio of Hall effect thrusters using in-channel electrodes to reduce ion-wall neutralization and focus the ion beam. A higher thrust-to-power ratio would give Hall thrusters increased thrust with the limited power available on spacecraft. A T-220HT Hall thruster is modified in this work to include a pair of ring electrodes within inside the discharge channel. The electrodes are biased above anode potential to repel ions from the walls and toward the channel centerline. Theoretical analysis of ion loss factors indicate that ion-wall neutralizations remove almost 13% of the total ions produced. Reduced wall losses could significantly improve the thruster performance without increased discharge power or propellant consumption. The thruster performance, plume ion characteristics, and internal plasma contours are experimentally measured. The plume and internal plasma measurements are important to determine the cause of the performance changes. The thruster is tested in three conditions: no electrode bias, low bias (10 V), and high bias (30 V). The performance measurements show the electrodes do indeed improve the thrust and thrust-to-power ratio, the latter only at the low bias level. Adding bias increases the ion density and decreases the plume angle compared to the no bias case. The plume measurements indicate that the performance improvements at low bias are due to increased ion number density as opposed to increased ion energy. The increased ion density is attributed to reduced wall losses, not increased ionization. The in-channel measurements support this due to little change in the acceleration potential or the electron temperature. At the high bias level, a drop in thrust-to-power ratio is seen, even though a larger increase in thrust is observed. This is due to increased power draw by the electrodes. Plume measurements reveal the increased thrust is due to ion acceleration. The internal measurements show increased acceleration potential and electron energy which can lead to increased ionization. At the high bias condition, the electrodes become the dominant positive terminal in the thruster circuit. This causes the increased ion acceleration and the creation of domed potential contours that conform to the near-wall cusp-magnetic fields. The domed contours produce focused electric fields, which cause the decreased wall losses and plume angle.

Thesis (MEng)--Stellenbosch University, 2014. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Recent years have seen a decline in the rate of space exploration due to the inefficiency of chemical rockets. Therefore alternative fuel efficient propulsion methods are being sought to enable cost effective deep space exploration. The high fuel efficiency of electric thrusters enable a spacecraft to travel further, faster and cheaper than any other propulsion technology available. Thus electric propulsion has become the propulsion of choice for scientists and engineers. A typically electric thruster contains some sort of electrode to ionise the propellant. Although this is feasible for short space missions, it becomes impractical for more ambitious space missions as electrodes erode over time. The alternative is to ionise the propellant using electromagnetic fields, which eliminates lifespan issues associated with electrode based thrusters. In order to examine methods of improving the lifespan and performance of electric thrusters, this thesis aimed to study the method of microwave discharge ionisation for an electric thruster. This includes the design of an RF Ion Thruster with extraction and acceleration grids to generate thrust. A 600 W 2.45 GHz magnetron (obtained from a conventional microwave oven), coupled to circular TM010 resonant cavity, was used to ionise neutral argon gas. The process of electron cyclotron resonance (ECR) was used to ensure the efficient ionisation of a high density plasma. The thrust was achieved with a three-grid system biased at high voltages to accelerate positively charged argon ions to high exhaust velocities. Results yielded the success of the designed electromagnetic based thruster, measuring approximatively 1.78 mN of thrust with a specific impulse of Isp = 3786 seconds. The ECR process produced a high plasma density with a plasma absorption rate of approximately 77% of the total input microwave power. The final results obtained were found to match the predicted results extremely well and resembled results found in literature. This demonstrates the efficiency of the RF ion thruster that was designed in this project and the future use in space exploration activities. However, future research needs to be undertaken on a controlled feedback system that will ensure optimal operating conditions for maximum performance. In addition, the method of grid-less acceleration needs to be studied to achieve maximum thrust and specific impulse. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: In onlangse jare het ’n afname in die tempo van die verkenning van die ruimte dit te danke aan die ondoeltreffendheid van chemiese vuurpyle. Derhalwe moet alternatiewe brandstof aandrywing metodes ondersoek word, om koste-effektiewe diep ruimte-eksplorasie moontlik te maak. Die hoë brandstof-doeltreffendheid van elektriese ontbranders stel ’n ruimtetuig in staat om verder, vinniger en goedkoper te reis as enige ander aandrywing tegnologie wat tans beskikbaar is. Dus het elektriese aandrywing metodes die aandrywings keuse vir wetenskaplikes en ingenieurs geword. ’n Tipies elektriese vuurpyl/aandrywer bevat ’n vorm van elektrode om die brandstof (argon gas) te ioniseer. Alhoewel hierdie elektrode proses van ionisasie effektief is vir kort ruimte missies, word dit onprakties vir meer ambisieuse ruimte missies as gevolg van verweering van elektrodes met verloop van tyd. ’n Alternatief is om die dryfmiddel/brandstof te ioniseer deur gebruik te maak van elektromagnetiese velde. Die elekromagnetiese velde sal die lewensduur van die vuurpyl vermeerder deur die verweering van elektrodes, wat geassosieer word met tipiese elektrieses vuurpyle, te elimineer. Hierdie tesis se doelwit is om die metode van mikrogolf ontslag ionisasie vir ’n elektriese vuurpyl/aandrywer te bestudeer om ten einde die lewensduur en doeltreffendheid van elektriese vuurpyl/aandrywer te ondersoek. Dit sluit in die ontwerp van ’n radio frekewensie ioon vuurpyl/aandrywer met ’n ontginning en versnelling matriks/rooster om stukrag te genereer. ’n 2,45 GHz magnetron (verkry vanaf ’n konvensionele mikrogolfoond), gekoppel aan ’n TM010 resonante holte, was gebruik om neutrale argon gas te ioniseer. Die proses van elektron siklotron resonansie (ESR) was gebruik om die doeltreffende ionisasie van ’n hoë digtheid plasma te verseker. Die aandrywing/stukrag was behaal met ’n drie-matriks-stelsel, bevoordeel deur hoë spannings om die positief-gelaaide argon ione te versnel. Resultate opgelewer, het die sukses van die ontwerp van ’n elektromagnetiese gebaseerde vuurpyl/aandrywer met ’n benaderde meting van ongeveer 1.78 mN van stukrag/aandrywing met ’n spesifieke impuls van Isp = 3786 sekondes bewys. Die ECR proses het ’n hoë plasma digtheid geproduseer met ’n plasma opname persentasie van ongeveer 77% van die totale inset mikrogolf energie. Die finale uitslae wat verkry was, het bevind dat die voorspelde resultate baie goed inpas met resultate in beskikbare literatuur. Dit dui op die doeltreffendheid van die RF ioon vuurpyl/aandrywer wat ontwerp is in hierdie projek vir die toekomstige gebruik in ruimte eksplorasie-aktiwiteite. Toekomstige navorsing moet op ’n beheerde terugvoer sisteem onderneem word, wat optimale werktoestande verseker vir maksimum prestasie. Daarbenewens moet die metode van matriks-lose versnelling bestudeer word, om maksimum versnelling/stukrag en spesifieke impuls te verseker.

L'objet de cette thèse est de démonter la faisabilité de conception d'un mini-drone longue endurance sans recourir à des véhicules de grande envergure qui nécessite des infrastructures supplémentaires, des systèmes de lancement complexes et un personnel d'exploitation important. Pour ce faire, une approche d'optimisation globale du problème a été utilisée, en s'appuyant sur les spécificités de chacun des aspects de la conception de mini-drones. Ce concept de mini-drone longue endurance doit repousser les limites dans plusieurs disciplines telles que l'aérodynamique, la propulsion, les structures, les sources d'énergies et le stockage, le contrôle et la navigation, ainsi que la miniaturisation de l'électronique embarquée. Un programme de conception baptisé Cdsgn a été développé et prend en compte les problèmes spécifiques de chaque discipline consacrées aux mini-drones. Il permet de voir l’influence de chaque paramètre de conception sur la performance finale de la conception, menant à la sélection optimale des paramètres. Cdsgn génère et analyse rapidement de nombreuses configurations de l'avion tout en simulant la performance de chaque configuration pour un pro fil de mission donnée. Un outil de post-traitement a également été développé afin de filtrer et sélectionner de manière interactive les paramètres de conception parmi les nombreuses configurations pour répondre à des applications pratiques. Le programme proposé a été utilisé dans le développement et la conception de plusieurs projets, tels que Solar Storm, premier mini-drone hybride au monde à énergie solaire d'une envergure de cinquante centimètre, SPOC, un mini-drone longue distance conçu pour voler au-dessus de la mer Méditerranée de Nice jusqu'en Corse (Calvii) et enfin Eternity, mini-drone de longue endurance d'une envergure d'un mètre, avec une configuration classique. Capable d'une autonomie de quatre heures avec les batteries embarquées, son temps de vol peut être amélioré jusqu’à huit heures avec l'utilisation de l’énergie solaire. En utilisant les évaluations de chaque projet, Cdsgn a été amélioré à la fois pour l'exactitude des calculs et pour la performance opérationnelle afin de développer le plus petit véhicule aérien pour une mission d'endurance donnée. / This thesis shows the feasibility of designing a long endurance mini UAV without resorting to large scale vehicles which requires additional infrastructure, complex launching systems and numerous operating crew. To do so is possible by using a global optimisation approach concentrated specifically on each aspect of the mini-UAV design with their particular challenges. So called Long Endurance Mini UAV Concept has to push the limits in several disciplines such as aerodynamics, propulsion, structures, energy source and storage, control and navigation, miniaturised electronics. A conceptual design program called Cdsgn is developed which takes into account each discipline's specific problems devoted to mini UAVs and making it possible to see the influence of each design parameter on the final performance of the complete design leading to the optimum selection of parameters. Cdsgn generates and analyse numerous aircraft configurations rapidly while simulating the performance of each configuration for a given mission profile. A post processing tool is also developed in order to interactively filter and select the final design parameters among numerous analysed aircraft configurations for practical applications. The proposed program is used in the development and design of several projects, such as Solar Storm, the world's first hybrid solar powered micro UAV in half a meter scale, SPOC, a long range mini UAV which is designed to fly across the Mediterranean sea from Nice to Corsica (Calvi) and finally the Eternity, the long endurance mini UAV concept which is an electrically powered, one-meter span aircraft with a conventional configuration having an endurance of four hours with the on-board batteries which can be enhanced up to eight hours with the use of solar-cells. Using the feedback of each project, Cdsgn has been improved both for the accuracy and for the operational performance in order to develop the smallest aerial vehicle for a given endurance mission.

Ce travail est dédié à la synthèse de composés polyazotés linéaires (N-N)2 et cycliques (N N)3, composés peu étudiés, pour des applications dans le domaine de la propulsion spatiale. La forte toxicité des hydrazines, utilisées actuellement dans les systèmes à biergols stockables et menacées par la réglementation REACH, impose aux industriels de les remplacer par de nouveaux ergols verts, aussi voire plus performants au niveau de la propulsion, mais surtout ne présentant aucun impact significatif sur la santé humaine et l’environnement. À ce jour, aucun candidat n’a été identifié pour remplacer les hydrazines spatiales. Cependant un candidat a été proposé par le CNES en raison de ses performances théoriques, il s'agit de ***. L’objectif principal de cette thèse est de converger le plus possible vers la synthèse de cette cible. Il s’agit également d’étudier la stabilité des composés polyazotés synthétisés et d’étendre la compréhension de la chimie de l’azote. Les différentes voies de synthèse des précurseurs, les triazanes et les azimines, sont présentées ainsi que leur réactivité notamment l’oxydation des triazanes et la photochimie des azimines / Anglais This work is dedicated to the synthesis of linear (N-N)2 and cyclic (N N)3 polynitrogen compounds, not well studied, for applications in the field of space propulsion. The high toxicity of hydrazines, currently used in storable bipropellant systems and threatened by the REACH regulation, imposes industrial businesses to replace them by new green propellants, with high or better propulsion performances, but also with low impact towards human health and the environment.To this day, no candidate has been identified to replace space-use hydrazines. However, one candidate has been proposed by the French Space Agency CNES, due to the theorical performances, namely ***. The main objective of this thesis is to converge as much as possible to the synthesis of this target molecule. The aim is to study the stability of the polynitrogen compounds synthesized and to extend the understanding of the nitrogen chemistry. The different pathways for the synthesis of precursors, the triazanes and the azimines, are developed as well as their reactivity especially the oxidation of triazanes and the photochemistry of azimines

The widely-used passenger and car ferries, sailing regularly and carrying heavy loads, form a unique type of marine vessel, providing vital transportation links to the coastal regions. Modern ferry ships usually are equipped with multiple diesel engines as prime movers. These diesel engines consume a large amount of marine diesel fuel with high fuel costs, and high emissions of greenhouse gas (GHG) and other harmful air pollutants, including CO2, HC, NOx, SO2, CO, and PM. To reduce fuel costs and the harmful emissions, the marine industry and ferry service providers have been seeking clean ship propulsion solutions. In this work, the model-based design (MBD) and optimization methodology for developing advanced electrified vehicles (EV) are applied to the modelling, design and control optimizations of clean marine vessels with a hybrid electric propulsion system. The research focuses on the design and optimization of the hybrid electric ship propulsion system and uses an open deck passenger and car ferry, the MV Tachek, operated by the British Columbia Ferry Services Inc. Canada, as a test case. At present, the ferry runs on the Quadra Island – Cortes Island route in British Columbia, Canada, with dynamically changing ocean conditions in different seasons over a year. The research first introduces the ship operation profile, using statistical ferry operation data collected from the ferry’s voyage data recorder and a data acquisition system that is specially designed and installed in this research. The ship operation profile model with ship power demand, travelling velocity and sailing route then serves as the design and control requirements of the hybrid electric marine propulsion system. The development of optimal power control and energy management strategies and the optimization of the powertrain architecture and key powertrain component sizes of the ship propulsion system are then carried out. Both of the series and parallel hybrid electric propulsion architectures have been studied. The sizes of crucial powertrain components, including the diesel engine and battery energy storage system (ESS), are optimized to achieve the best system energy efficiency. The optimal power control and energy management strategies are optimized using dynamic programming (DP) over a complete ferry sailing trip. The predicted energy efficiency and emission reduction improvements of the proposed new ship with the optimized hybrid propulsion system are compared with those of two benchmark vessels to demonstrate the benefits of the new design methodology and the optimized hybrid electric ship propulsion system design. These two benchmarks include a conventional ferry with the old diesel-mechanical propulsion system, and the Power Take In (PTI) hybrid electric propulsion systems installed on the MV Tachek at present. The simulation results using the integrated ship propulsion system model showed that the newly proposed hybrid electric ship could have 17.41% fuel saving over the conventional diesel-mechanical ship, and 22.98% fuel saving over the present MV Tachek. The proposed optimized hybrid electric propulsion system, combining the advantages of diesel-electric, pure electric, and mechanical propulsions, presented considerably improved energy efficiency and emissions reduction. The research forms the foundation for future hybrid electric ferry design and development. / Graduate

La question de la propulsion spatiale a été un enjeu politique au coeur de la guerre froide et reste un enjeu stratégique de nos jours. La technologie chimique déjà en place sur les moteurs fusées s'avère être limitée par la vitesse d'éjection et la durée de vie des appareils. La propulsion électrique et plus particulièrement le moteur à effet Hall apparait ainsi comme la technologie la plus performante et la plus utilisée pour diriger un satellite dans l'espace. Cependant, la physique à l'intérieur d'un propulseur étant complexe, de par les champs électromagnétiques ou les processus de collisions importants, toutes les particularités de fonctionnement du moteur ne sont pas parfaitement expliquées. Au bout de centaines d'heures d'essais, certains prototypes voient leur paroi s'éroder de façon anormale et des instabilités électromagnétiques se développent au sein de la chambre d'ionisation. La mobilité des électrons mesurée est en contradiction avec les modèles analytiques et soulèvent des problématiques sur la physique du plasma à l'intérieur de ces moteurs. Par conséquent, le code AVIP a été développé afin de proposer un code 3D massivement parallèle et non-structuré à Safran Aircraft Engines modélisant le plasma instationnaire à l'intérieur du propulseur. Des méthodes lagrangiennes et eulériennes sont utilisées et intégrées dans le code et mon travail s'est concentré sur le développement d'un modèle fluide, étant plus rapide et donc mieux adapté à la conception et au design industriel. Le modèle fluide est basé sur un modèle aux moments avec une expression rigoureuse des termes de collisions et une description précise des conditions limites pour les gaines. Ce modèle a été implémenté numériquement dans un formalisme non structuré et optimisé de façon à être performant sur les nouvelles architectures de calcul. La modélisation retenue et les efforts d'optimisation ont permis de réaliser un calcul réel de moteur à effet Hall afin de retrouver les propriétés globales de fonctionnement telles que l'accélération des ions ou encore la localisation de la zone d'ionisation. Un second cas d'application a finalement reproduit avec succès les instabilités azimutales dans le propulseur avec un modèle fluide et a justifié le rôle de ces instabilités dans le transport anormal des électrons et l'érosion des parois / The space propulsion has been a political issue in the midst of the Cold War and remains nowadays a strategic and industrial issue. The chemical propulsion on rocket engines is limited by its ejection velocity and its lifetime. Electric propulsion and more particularly Hall effect thrusters appear then as the most powerful and used technology for space satellite operation. The physic inside a thruster is complex because of the electromagnetic fields and important collision processes. Therefore, all specificities of the engine operation are not perfectly understood. After hundreds of hours of tests, thruster walls are curiously eroded and electromagnetic instabilities are developping within the ionization chamber. The measured electron mobility is in contradiction with the analytical models and raises issues on the plasma behavior inside the discharg chamber. As a result, the AVIP code was developed to provide a massively parallel and unstructured 3D code to Safran Aircraft Engines modeling unsteady plasma inside the thruster. Lagrangian and Eulerian methods are used and integrated in the solver and my work has focused on the development of a fluid model which is faster and therefore better suited to industrial conception. The model is based on a set of equations for neutrals, ions and electrons without drift-diffusion hypothesis, combined with a Poisson equation to describe the electric potential. A rigorous expression of collision terms and a precise description of the boundary conditions for sheaths have been established. This model has been implemented numerically in an unstructured formalism and optimized to obtain good performances on new computing architectures. The model and the numerical implementation allow us to perform a real Hall effect thruster simulation. Overall operating properties such as the acceleration of the ions or the location of the ionization zone are captured. Finally, a second application has successfully reproduced azimuthal instabilities in the Hall thruster with the fluid model and justified the role of these instabilities in the anomalous electron transport and in theerosion of the walls

I samband med klimatmålet att Sverige ska ha ett netto-noll utsläpp av växthusgaser till 2045 krävs det att alla sektorer minskar sina växthusgasutsläpp och av sektorerna utgör sjöfarten inrikes en mindre men fortfarande betydande del. Två omtalade förnyelsebara driftstyper är batteri- och vätgasdrift, som har potential att ersätta fossila bränslen. Med hänsyn till detta syftar rapporten till att jämföra dessa två driftsformer, utifrån ett hållbarhetsperspektiv, i Gotlandsbolagets färjor. Jämförelseanalysen grundar sig i en kvantitativ litteraturstudie samt i form av en intervju och mejlkonversationer. I resultatet har aspekter som energibehov, vikt, utrymme, hastighet, infrastruktur och koldioxidutsläpp undersökts. Gällande diskussionsdelen avhandlas bland annat behovet av en energimässig marginal, betydelsen av fossilfri el för respektive driftsform, dimensionering av en ny elkabel till Gotland samt områden som bör utredas vidare. Av rapporten kan det bland annat konstateras att vätgasdrift ger upphov till lägre växthusgasutsläpp vid en svensk elmix medan den vid nordisk elmix ger upphov till mer utsläpp jämfört med batteridrift. En konvertering av färjan M/S Drotten är troligen möjlig att genomföra utifrån de valda aspekterna. / In correlation with the climate goal that Sweden should have a net-zero emission of greenhouse gasses by 2045, it is required that all sectors reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. Of all the sectors, domestic shipping is a small but still significant part. Two well-known renewable operating propulsions are battery and hydrogen, which have the potential to substitute fossil fuels. With this in mind, the report aims to compare these two propulsions from a sustainability perspective in Gotlandsbolaget’s ferries. The comparison analysis is based on a quantitative literature study, an interview and email conversations. In the result, aspects such as energy demand, weight, space, speed, infrastructure and carbon dioxide emissions have been investigated. Moreover, in the discussion part, aspects such as an energy margin, the importance of fossil-free electricity for both propulsions, designing of a new power cable to Gotland, and areas that should be investigated further have been touched upon. From the report, it can be stated, among other things, that hydrogen propulsion results in lower greenhouse gas emissions when a Swedish electricity mix is used. However, when a Nordic electricity mix is used, which has higher emissions than the Swedish, hydrogen propulsion results in higher greenhouse gas emissions compared to battery propulsion. Lastly, a conversion of the ferry M/S Drotten is probably possible based on the selected aspects.

Earlier research has demonstrated that downstream of combustion in a rotating detonation engine, exhaust flow periodically reverses circumferential direction. For small periods, the circumferential flow reaches velocity magnitudes rivaling the bulk flow of exhaust, manifesting as a swirl. The minimization of this swirl is critical to maximizing thrust and engine performance for rocket propulsion. During this study, numerous nozzle contours were iteratively designed and analyzed for losses analytically. Once a nozzle was chosen, further losses were validated through computational fluid dynamics simulations and then tested experimentally. Three different configurations were run with the RDRE: no nozzle, a nozzle without a spike, and a nozzle with a spike. Images of the exhaust quality were recorded using OH* chemiluminescence in high-speed cameras. One camera was used to confirm the existence of a detonation and the frequency of detonation. The second camera is pointed perpendicular to the exhaust flow to capture the quality of exhaust. Quantitative results of the turbulent velocity fluctuations were obtained through particle image velocimetry of the side-imaging frames. All frames in each case were exported and converted to several time-averaged frames whereupon the time-averaged turbulent velocity fluctuation profiles could be compared between cases for swirl attenuation.