Posted on 04/09/2021 11:26:36 AM PDT by Olog-hai
It's a fairly small aircraft, with a length of just 21 meters (68.8 feet). But after a tough year for the airline industry, it symbolizes a big step forward in aviation history as the first privately built supersonic aircraft.
Every other supersonic aircraft up to this point — the European Concorde flown until 2003 and the Soviet Tu-144 flown until 1999, as well as many fast military aircraft — was funded by billions from state coffers and built with government mandates.
Startup Boom Supersonic from Denver in the US is different. It unveiled the first privately manufactured supersonic jet last October. The single-seat XB-1 is nicknamed Baby Boom. […]
The aim is to validate the aerodynamic concept and then basically build the same thing on a bigger scale — to result in the Overture passenger airliner for up to 75 passengers. By the second half of this decade, it is supposed to become a smaller-scale successor to the Concorde, which had a capacity of 100 passengers. The Overture will zip passengers from London to New York in 3½ hours at Mach 2.2 (about 2,700 km/h), faster than the Concorde. The company says it will use aviation fuel produced in a CO2-neutral way. […]
Just before Easter, Aerion made an announcement that stunned industry observers. By the end of this decade, the company plans to make a quantum leap in fast air transportation with its AS3, another new jet. Up to 50 passengers will be able to travel for a maximum of 13,000 kilometers at Mach 4 (about 5,000 km/h) or even faster. This would mean an airliner would finally reach the low hypersonic region, which starts at Mach 5. …
(Excerpt) Read more at dw.com ...
Can’t wait.
...21,000 mph when? /s
Aerodynamic shapes don’t simply “scale up”. Plus, supersonic cruise is going to require revolutionary engines, a lot of fuel, and some kind of strategy to deal with heat dissipation. All of this means that, like the Concorde, it will be non-competitive for the average passenger dollar. But then John Kerry can get to the annual Davos forum much more quickly and without having to rub elbow with non-elite passengers who rudely snap pictures of is maskless horse-face.
Warp drive! Now!
The real trick is to:
1) Travel at those speeds using close to the same per-seat fuel usage as conventional airliners, and
2) Design the aircraft so the sonic boom is deflected upwards, so you can travel supersonic over populated land.
The ultimate downfall of the Concorde was the incredibly high fuel usage combined with the inability to fly supersonic over land. Thus only a few routes (NY to London, NY to Paris) were possible, and only profitable with $6,000 per passenger tickets.
Probably over $4,000 per seat, one way.
LA to Sydney or Tokyo would have worked great but I don’t think it had the range to do it.
Sounds great, but will half the pilots be women or POC?
“Probably over $4,000 per seat, one way.”
The normal flight time NY to London is 7 hours versus 3.5 hours. Lets say it normally costs $1,000 one way so you are getting paid $3,000, after taxes, for 3.5 hours of savings or $857 per hour. Keep in mind the number of departure options will be limited, particularly at that rate. The cabin space on the fast flight I suspect will be rather tight as well.
However, you don’t have to fly with the commoners.
“Plus, supersonic cruise is going to require revolutionary engines, a lot of fuel, and some kind of strategy to deal with heat dissipation.”
Say hello to the SR-71.
“Design the aircraft so the sonic boom is deflected upwards, so you can travel supersonic over populated land”
Over 30,00 feet the boom is not really noticeable so over-land Mach is no problem. . .
Um, I really don’t have time to debate the reality of supersonic cruise engines but with a little websearching, you can find many current examples, all of them with very good SFC and decades of flight history in their predecessor engines.
Note the paragraph about “In 1988, ...Preliminary study had shown that IDF could supercruise with the new engine. ....”
In addition, the AS2 will use the GE Affinity Engine which is really just an adaptation of the CFM56 with some interesting extra diffusion provided by the second stage fan compounding and a not surprising medium bypass flow split, typical for a supersonic design point.
Nothing “revolutionary” unless you compare it to their now aging 1970s F404 designs.
So the engines are really the driving factor. The modern 3D Viscous/MDO code designs are light years ahead of where we were in 1965, which is the last time real supersonic aircraft were even attempted.
The real issue is sonic boom, and there are all kinds of good approaches now to mitigate that, but it’s an airframe/operations problem, not an engine problem.
The winner of the supersonic bizjet/airliner competition starting now will be the one with the best marketing plan, not the latest/greatest technology - the technology is there to do this.
That fact has been recognized by many and that’s why there’s so much activity: just takes the will power to get it done now.
“The company says it will use aviation fuel produced in a CO2-neutral way”
They plan to fail already. Any startup that announces something so stupid is run by people looking for sucker investors. I’m a recovering aircraft engineer. I’ve seen it a hundred times.
“The company says it will use aviation fuel produced in a CO2-neutral way”
They plan to fail already. Any startup that announces something so stupid is run by people looking for sucker investors. I’m a recovering aircraft engineer. I’ve seen it a hundred times.
SR leaked fuel from its tanks before hitting such high speeds the metal of the tanks expanded...sealing off the fuel tanks...IIRC.
P.S.....why BOOM supersonic? Can you imagine the cute headlines if one of those things blows up or crashes?
I’ll second that. I actually worked with Aerion in the early 2000’s doing some design and rendering work (cover of Aviation Week). It’s been almost 20 years and no full sized flights.
I also know the founder of Boom through Y-Combinator. He’s a software guy that got his pilot’s license in 2013 or something and decided that it would be cool to fly supersonic. No engineering background, and a very pie in the sky (as it were) attitude. They’ve raised a ton of money from Silicon Valley types, hired some good engineers, but ultimately are likely to be bested by physics and economics.
Years ago flew the Concord back and forth to London a number of times. Flying at 60,000 feet and 1,300 miles per hour is a rush.
My original post stands.
And imagine the cute headlines when a standard tube crashes. . .
“in 1965, which is the last time real supersonic aircraft were even attempted.”
If you ignore the F-22 and its super-cruise capability (its engines are a big part of its super-cruise capability).
I suspect you are referring to commercial aircraft. . .but since then, R&D has been on-going. . .lesson’s learned from military R&D can be data-points the commercial world can use.
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