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G0TEZ > AERO 18.09.12 20:56l 73 Lines 3002 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
BID : C00105G0TEZ
Read: DK3UZ GUEST
Subj: Skylon v Scramjet.
Path: DB0FHN<DB0FOR<DB0SIF<DB0GV<DB0LJ<DB0RES<WA7V<SR1BSZ<IV3SCP<IW0QNL<
JH4XSY<JE7YGF<GB7CIP
Sent: 120918/1812Z @:GB7CIP.#32.GBR.EU #:59434 [Caterham Surrey GBR] $:C00105G0
From: G0TEZ@GB7CIP.#32.GBR.EU
To : AERO@WW
I was in two minds as to whether to address this to SPCE but I never read
those so, maybe someon will read this.
The big problem with space flight at the moment is sheer expense. Since
the demise of the spac shuttle and having to revert to using the Soyuz
rocket, the Americans have been putting out there ground to space options
to the private sector.
The main problem with all launch systems is that they us a two stage
booster system and dump the expensive booster after launch.
The same thing affects the US scramjet project. They launch it from a
bomber, accelerate it with a rocket then use the 'scramjet' from then on,
effectively a 3 stage system.
When I recorded a film called 'The Three Rocketeers' recently. I was not
expecting much but it was very interesting. Three men have worked for many
years on an upgrade to the old Rolls Royce HOTOL project (Horizontal Take
Off and Landing). Eventually, the government cut their funding, gave all
the rights to their engine to Rolls Royce and clssified it as SECRET. The
British Official Secrets Act is a very serious thing, not to be taken
lightly.
The three man team went ahead and designed Skylon with a different engine,
not coverd by the RR patents. Briefly, they have designed and made models
of and air/spacecraft which will take off from an ordinary runway just
like an ordinary jet aircraft and go into space, or, if you like, take you
from the UK to Australia in 4 housr at over Mach 5 and land on an ordinary
runway. All without throwing away any rocket boosters or any other bits
and pieces. All at half the price of any competing design.
For more details, you can go to www.reactionengines.co.uk which has a
short film and several excellent diagrams. The economics are right for
someone to increase their funding to the point where a prototype can be
made and tested. Only the three men know all the details of the technology
of the thing and I noticed some large omissions and deliberate lies in the
TV film.
See if you can spot them.?
BTW, I am puzzled by the term 'Scramjet' back when I was a schoolboy in
the 1950s, books on jets mentioned the ramjet as being too inefficient at
under 800 kts. In other words, below the speed of sound at sea level.
Hence the use of Frank Whittle's conventional compressor type jet engine.
I felt a bit sad about a remark by prof: Bond, the head of the team, that
he was now an old man and might not live to see his ideas become fact.
That is what happened to John Logie baird who died aged 56 in 1946 and
could not defend his large screen,3D colour TV. Leaving the field open for
people to deny his system and treat his inventions as down right liss His
ideas were, in fact stolen by RCA and used in conjunction with
Philo.T.Farnsworth's ideas, also stolen, to give us small, B&W TV sets.
Good luck to the Three Rocketeers.
73 - Ian, G0TEZ @ GB7CIP
Message timed: 19:12 on 2012-Sep-18 BST
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