Investigation of channel interactions in a nested hall thruster part II: Probes and performance
Divergence angle and thrust measurements for a nested Hall thruster in different operating modes are presented. The X2 thruster, a two-channel nested Hall thruster, was run in both single channel and dual-channel modes. The divergence angle for each channel was measured in both modes using a near-field Faraday probe. In single channel mode, pressure was controlled via downstream injection as well as by owing through the non-operating channel. Results show that thrust increases 5% and 11% in dual channel mode versus the summation of single-channels for high and low power operation respectively. When pressure is controlled via channel injection, thrust numbers for dual channel operation and the summation of single channel operation match. These results indicate that this increase in thrust is due to neutral ingestion from the adjacent channel during dual channel mode.
