On Mon, 29 Mar 2004 06:24:58 GMT, "Franz Geff"
wrote:

Has any other country had success with a Ramjet or Scramjet??? France tried
Hypersonics in the 50s and failed I believe (wasn't it called the Griffon
Aircraft). I have been following many new aerospace developments for a
number of years (namely scramjets and aerospike rocket engines).

Russia and France supposedly launched one on the nose of an SA-5.

Russia supposedly flew a scramjet powered RV on a Topal a month or two
ago.







A few things that came to mind ...

Why was the X-43 important? Firstly it is a PROOF OF CONCEPT. Hypersonic
Aircraft via Scramjet is possible. Secondly it gives the MILITARY the
ability to make advanced CRUISE missiles that can get to a target quickly.

Hardly. The military is already going a different route with
scramjets. The X-43A uses hydrogen fuel. The stuff the military
wants to use uses hydrocarbon fuel (don't know if it's regular jet
fuel) and uses it to cool the airframe and uses the airframe heat to
breakdown the fuel molecules before feeding them into the engine.
It's already been tested albeit in a wind tunnel. Not only that the
X-43A's engine ran for a grand total of about seven seconds. That and
the need for a big ass booster to get it to speed so the scramjet
could start up makes it completely useless as a weapon.





If anyone listed to the interview with the scientist on Friday (NPR/PRI),
they said that if this test was successful, military applications would be
the FIRST application.

I think Space Shuttles and Commercial applications are still at least 20
years out.

At the rate they're going I'd guess more like 30 to 40 years. Hell it
will be 20 before a Shuttle replacement is flying. And that dinky
space plane proposal they have out there is not a Shuttle replacement.



Military apps may see the light of day in about 5-10 years, if
needed they could be rushed out. The example used by the scientist was the
Bin Laden sticking his head out of a hole and todays technology only able to
hit the target in about 3-4 hours. With Hypersonic missiles, targets become
much more targetable ... hmmm

This missile was allowed to glide into the Pacific. Strangely enough this
missile could be retrieved by the a foreign government (Russia, China or
France).

I doubt they'd bother. I'd be surprised if there were anything on the
vehicle in the way of materials or geometry that isn't already well
known and publicly available.





The X-43 though is way cool, but I am trying to understand if using such an
engine will enable an aircraft to enter space or even reach escape velocity
... someone help me out ...

If you could make materials or come up with a way of cooling that
would allow you to run up to orbital or escape velocity while in the
atmosphere with enough extra for the coast out then sure. With the
X-30 they were trying a lot of active cooling with LH2 and in the end
they still figured they'd need a rocket to give it the final boost
into orbit. They never specified how they were going to get to
scramjet speeds in the first place with it. Look up "strut jet" if
you want to see something that will get you from the ground to space
with one engine. In theory anyway :-)