Skip to content

VASIMR VX-200 Validation

Reference

Olsen, C. S., et al. (2015). Investigation of plasma detachment from a magnetic nozzle in the plume of the VX-200 magnetoplasma thruster. IEEE Transactions on Plasma Science, 43(1), 252–268.

Physics

The Ad Astra VX-200 VASIMR thruster operates at 200 kW RF input power with a helicon + ICRH heating stage, producing an argon or hydrogen plasma exhausted through a magnetic nozzle. This case validates:

  1. Thrust: within 15% of measured 5.7 N (at 200 kW)
  2. Specific impulse: within 15% of measured ~5000 s
  3. Plume half-angle: within ±5° of measured value

Configuration

from helicon.validate.cases.vasimr_plume import VasimrPlumeCase
case = VasimrPlumeCase()
config = case.get_config()

Key parameters matching VX-200 operating point:

Parameter Value
Propellant Ar⁺
\(n_0\) \(5 \times 10^{19}\) m⁻³
\(T_i\) 1000 eV
\(T_e\) 50 eV
\(B_{throat}\) 2.0 T
Power 200 kW

Acceptance Criteria

  • Thrust: \(|F_{sim} - F_{exp}| / F_{exp} < 15\%\)
  • Isp: \(|Isp_{sim} - Isp_{exp}| / Isp_{exp} < 15\%\)
  • Detachment efficiency: \(\eta_{det} > 0.85\)

Running

helicon validate --case vasimr

from helicon.validate.runner import run_validation
result = run_validation("vasimr", dry_run=True)
print(result.summary)

Results

See docs/validation_results/vasimr/ for thrust and Isp comparison.