Experimental and Computational Investigation of a RF Plasma Micro- Thruster (Preprint); Technical paper

摘要

A prototype RF plasma micro-thruster has been investigated numerically and experimentally. The experimental results were obtained on a thrust stand capable of micro-Newton resolution. Thrust and mass flow (hence specific impulse) were measured for an argon propellant at mass flows ranging from 0.4 to 5.5 mg/sec. An increase to the cold gas thrust of up to 20% was observed for a discharge frequency of 100 MHz and an input power of 70 W. Propulsive efficiency was seen to increase both experimentally and numerically for increasing mass flow and decreasing discharge frequency.