Rocket exhaust plume effects to communication links in telemetry band

In the scope of this study, the approaches intended to examine the interactions between RF signal and exhaust plume for a given engine configuration and fuel mixture is examined. At the first approach, a fast and simple determination method which gives an idea for the reflection of signal is given by neglecting the collisions between the species at the plasma structured exhaust plume. At the second approach, the attenuation caused by plasma structure is calculated by including the collisions between the species and free electrons at the exhaust plume. Finally, the effects caused by exhaust plume is observed by modelling an exhaust plume example with a given temperature and electron distribution conditions in CST software tool.