It is time to pay attention to this story.
If this engine can operate over the range of velocity required, then it
will be the magic bullet for getting us into space. It has always been obvious that higher
velocities were a possibility provided the altitude was sufficient. It was just impossible to get there with our
present engine technology.
Even ramjets are curiosities that need another engine to get up to ignition
speed.
Thus an engine design able to go from dirt to near space was at best a
theoretical possibility only. Once in
near space, injection into orbit is simply a function of fuel and oxygen
provision. The challenge was always to
find a way to use atmospheric oxygen.
Let us hope it works as designed. The
wonder of modern technology is that it is possible with computer design and
simulation to realize the imagination quickly and cheaply. Thus we are really seeing bold design
concepts going into prototype.
One giant leap for civilian space
travel: Scientists successfully test engine for Skylon craft that can fly
anywhere on earth in just four hours
UPDATED: 23:17 GMT, 28 April 2012
Tests have begun on a new engine that could launch
a plane into space and revolutionise the way we travel - making it possible to
reach anywhere on Earth in just four hours.
The 270ft Skylon spaceplane would take off and
land from a conventional runway but fly 18 miles above the ground and out of
the Earth's atmosphere at five times the speed of sound.
Critical tests are now being carried out to make
sure the Sabre engine - a hybrid that can operate like a normal jet engine but
then switch to rocket mode - is faultless before its developers Reaction
Engines Limited (REL) based in Culham, Oxfordshire, can unveil it at the
Farnborough International Air Show.
Ground
breaking: The Sabre engine operates like a normal jet engine but can then
switch to rocket mode to propel spaceplanes into orbit
Space
age: The engine could transform the way we travel - making it possible to get
anywhere in the Earth within just four hours
Reaction Engines Limited, which designed and built
the innovative engine, is hoping for a perfect performance so they can then
approach investors to raise the £250m needed to take the project into the final
design phase.
REL managing director Alan Bond told the BBC: 'We
can reduce the world to four hours - the maximum time it would take to go
anywhere. And that it also gives us an aircraft that can go into space, replacing
all the expendable rockets we use today.'
The Skylon’s innovative engine uses propulsion to
reach the edge of the Earth’s atmosphere before switching to rocket power to
get into orbit.
Keeping
quiet: Reaction Engines Limited is based in a busy science park so the exhaust
goes into a silencer where the noise is damped by means of water spray
Steamy:
Bystanders are soaked by by steam as gases hit the silencing water spray
The first phase of the engine uses a special type
of pre-cooler heat exchanger that takes oxygen from the atmosphere to be cooled
by more than 100C before being compressed into the engine and burned with
hydrogen.
Moisture in the air would normally freeze,
blocking the pre-cooler's pipes in a blanket of frost and stopping it from
working, but very cold helium in the piping stops this from happening.
The cold oxygen is then used to power the
plane.
A second phase then kicks in which draws on liquid
hydrogen and a small supply of liquid oxygen to propel the plane into space.
The
270ft-long Skylon space plane will be able to take passengers into space at a
fraction of the current cost
A cutaway
of the Skylon space plane, which shows the two hydrogen and oxygen tanks
The approach should save weight and allow Skylon
to go straight to orbit without the need for the multiple propellant stages
seen in rockets.
Mr Bond continued: 'That is a piece of real Sabre
engine. We don't have to go away and develop the real thing when we've done
these tests; this is the real article.'
Because REL is working on a busy science park, it
has to keep noise to a minimum, so the exhaust goes into a silencer where the
noise is damped by a water spray.
The exhaust gases are at several hundred degrees,
so the water is instantly vaporised, producing huge clouds of steam.
The
Skylon is able to take off and land at a normal airport, reducing the cost of
space flight
Any bystanders get very wet because the vapour
rains straight back down to the ground.
So far, 85 per cent of the funding for Reaction
Engines' endeavours has come from private investors, but the company may need
government support if it is to raise all of the £250m needed for it to move on
to completing the design.
Mr Bond continued: It gives people confidence that
what we're doing is meaningful and real - that it's not science fiction. So,
government money is a very powerful tool to lever private investment.'
Speaking about the engine when it was still in its
early stages, technical director and one of the founders of Reaction
Engines, Richard Varvill, told the Engineer magazine:
’Access to space is extraordinarily expensive, yet
there’s no law of physics that says it has to be that way. We just need to
prove it’s viable.’
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