Demonstration of a Laser Welded Channel Wall Nozzle - Vulcain 2 Scale

Volvo Aero has for over ten years continuously developed and improved its patented manufacturing method for actively cooled nozzle extensions, i.e. the laser welded channel wall technology. The technology was the outcome of a project with the objective to develop a cooled wall structure that meets commercial requirements. The technology defined encompasses short development and production lead time and low production cost, which is achieved by using robust standard processes and commercially available raw material. A trade study, to evaluate different metallic nozzle technologies for future applications, has been performed in Europe by Volvo Aero together with EADS-ST GmbH responsible for the Thrust Chamber and Snecma, responsible for the Vulcain 2 engine on a CNES initiative. This study resulted in a decision to proceed with design and manufacturing of a full scale demonstrator NE where one of the core processes in this down select was the Volvo Aero laser welded channel wall technology, which will be applied to build the nozzle cooling channels. In addition, the external reinforcements will be fabricated using laser metal deposition which is a technology with great potential for a number of applications. This paper presents the effort undertaken to design and manufacture this full scale Sandwich demonstrator NE which is aimed for testing on a Vulcain 2 engine during the end of 2007.