A novel method to realize a non-uniform heat flux distribution through the variable-speed scanning of an electron beam

Quartz lamp heaters and hypersonic wind tunnel are currently applied in thermal assessment of heat resistant materials and surface of aircraft. However, it is difficult to achieve precise heat flux distribution by quartz lamp heaters, while enormous energy is required by a large scale hypersonic wind tunnel. Electron beam can be focused into a beam spot of millimeter scale by an electromagnetic lens and electron-magnetically deflected to achieve a rapid scanning over a workpiece. Moreover, it is of high energy utilization efficiency when applying an electron beam to heat a metal workpiece. Therefore, we propose to apply an electron beam with a variable speed to establish a novel method to realize various non-uniform heat flux boundary conditions. Besides, an electron beam thermal assessment equipment is devised. To analyze the feasibility of this method, an approach to calculate the heat flux distribution formed by an electron beam with variable-speed scanning is constructed with beam power, diameter of the beam spot and dwell duration of the electron beam at various locations as the key parameters. To realize a desired non-uniform heat flux distribution of the maximum gradient of 1.1 MW/m(3), a variable-speed scanning strategy is constructed on basis of the conservation of energy. Compared with the desired heat flux, the maximum deviation of the scanned heat flux is 4.5% and the deviation in the main thermal assessment area is less than 3%. To verify the method, taking the time-average scanned heat flux as the boundary condition, a heat transfer model is constructed and temperature results are calculated. The experiment of variable-speed scanning of an electron beam according to the scanning strategy has been carried out. The measured temperatures are in good agreement with the predicted results at various locations. Temperature fluctuation during the scanning process is analyzed, and it is found to be proportional to the scanned heat flux divided by volumetric heat capacity, which is applicable for different materials up to 3.35 MW/m(2). This study provides a novel and effective method for precise realization of various non-uniform heat flux boundary conditions.