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'Impossible' Detonation Engine
[ScienceAlert] A type of rocket engine once thought impossible has just been fired up in the lab. Engineers have built and successfully tested what is known as a rotating detonation engine, which generates thrust via a self-sustaining wave of detonations that travel around a circular channel.As this engine requires far less fuel than the combustion engines currently used to power rockets, it could eventually mean a more efficient and much lighter means of getting our ships into space. "The study presents, for the first time, experimental evidence of a safe and functioning hydrogen and oxygen propellant detonation in a rotating detonation rocket engine," said aerospace engineer Kareem Ahmed of the University of Central Florida. The idea of the rotating detonation engine goes back to the 1950s. It consists of a ring-shaped - annular - thrust chamber created by two cylinders of different diameters stacked inside one another, creating a gap in between. Gas fuel and oxidiser are then injected into this chamber through small holes and ignited. This creates the first detonation, which produces a supersonic shockwave that bounces around the chamber. That shockwave ignites the next detonation, which ignites the next, and so forth, producing an ongoing supersonic shockwave to generate thrust. This should produce more energy for less fuel compared to combustion, which is why the US Military is investigating and funding it; this new research was funded by the US Air Force, and it's not the only such project the military are looking into. Much more at the link. Posted by: Deacon Blues 2020-05-08 |
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