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Posted on 09/26/2025 11:34:48 PM PDT by Jonty30
What has zero moving parts, yet can blast an aerial vehicle to velocities beyond Mach 5? The answer is the recently flight-tested Atmospheric Test of Launched Airbreathing System (ATLAS) powered by a new solid-fueled ramjet built by GE Aerospace.
Hypersonic missiles capable of flying well in excess of five times the speed of sound promise to revolutionize warfare and aviation in general in a manner not seen since the sound barrier was broken in 1947. Not only could it turn flights from London to Sydney into an afternoon jaunt instead of a 22-plus-hour ordeal, it could also make current air defenses obsolete as vehicles blast by before defenders would even detect them.
The tricky bit is how to get the vehicle into the hypersonic range where it can cruise under its own power or fly as a Mach 5+ glider. For the ATLAS program, GE Aerospace has come up with the latest in Solid-Fuel Ramjet (SFRJ) technology that seems to operate almost by magic.
(Excerpt) Read more at newatlas.com ...
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I guess once you light the solid state fuel, you can’t modulate it for performance and just have to let it burn. I guess that’s how it works.
You guys are great. Hahaha.
The whole vehicle is the engine. The compression needed to make the jet work is achieved by the vehicles speed.
Methinks it might just be loud.
“How would this work? “
think “bottle rocket”
You need one moving part.
Sounds like a ramjet. Nothing new about that. Just need to pack it full of fuel to keep it going.
I’ve said this before, and some here don’t like it, but the rate of innovation in commercial aviation during the last 60 years have been pretty pathetic compared to the incredible innovation of the first 60 years (from the Wright brothers in 1903 to 1963). Sure commercial jets are safer, and there have been improvements in fuel efficiency and auto-pilot tech and a lot of that, but from the passenger side, it’s been very stagnant. I’m not flying to Europe any faster than I did 50 years ago. I get it that government regulations ( sonic-boom rules specifically) have limited what the aerospace companies can do. But, still, it’s been disappointing.
(flights from London to Sydney)
I gotta go from a’1984’ Tourist Trap
to a place where I can’t concealed carry?
Are there other, better choices?
😃😄🤣🤣🤣😜
BUT——WHAT GETS IT FROM “ZERO” TO “SPEED”?????
The efforts have been for fuel economy, which has required much higher engine temperatures. That has required new engine materials.
The engines from the 747 our family flew in 1972 to Britain is nothing like current engines.
Just the turbine blades. Early days jet engines turbine blade was a steel forging. Now its nickel based alloy, single crystal structure. Each blade on the turbine costs $20,000+ and there are 3 turbine wheels with ~ 100 blades each.
Compressor blades are cheaper, maybe 10K but maybe 6 turbine wheels.
So each engine has ~ 10 to 12 million dollars in blades, and that’s not the whole engine. Just the blades.
Renowned rocket scientist Dr. W. E. Coyote figured this out decades ago.
Ramjets and Scramjets require the aircraft to be going supersonic speeds before they can even work.
So there has to be some separate way of getting them up to speed.
The solid fuel rocket booster
Part of that can be explained by there being a lower ceiling on aviation development compared to other technologies.
Which explains the booster in the article. Get it off the ground and then ram-jet it.
Just light the fuse and stand back.
I doubt it’s listed in the Bill of Materials, but the air passing through a forward inlet could be considered a moving part since it factors so heavily into the sustained dynamics of the engine’s operation. I’d think that a unit cost could be calculated reliably. $$$ per volume @ altitude x duration of combustion?
Excellent point.
Ask Dyson. ;-)
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