Engineering Assessment

Aeronautical Propulsion systems

There are 4 main types of aeronautical propulsion systems, The Propeller which was used in early aeroplanes, the gas turbine or jet engine which is used in larger commercial planes and high speed aeroplanes, the ramjet which is used in afterburner systems, and the rocket which is used in high altitude flights such as the new Virgin VSS Enterprise. Propellers work on the same basic principle as the wing of the aeroplane, as the air travels toward the wing some air is diverted above, and some below, the air above has decreased pressure, and the air below then has an increased pressure are, this results in the wing lifting upwards, the same is applied to the propeller of the aeroplane, as the propeller spins a low pressure area is created in front of it, and a low pressure area behind, this causes the plane to travel forwards. The blades of the propeller may be tilted in flight to achieve the most efficient angle of attack; this is known as the pitch of the blades. As the speed of the Aeroplane increases the op timum angle of attack varies as wind resistance on the propeller is increased by the increasing speed. Lower angles give greater thrust, but require more power to turn the rotor, while lesser angles require more rotational speed to give the same amount of thrust, so the angle of the propeller must be varied accordingly. Some specialised planes may rotate their pitch to 0 to allow the blades to be parallel to the wind resistance to reduce drag while gliding, and some may reverse the pitch to allow the plane to slow down much faster without the use of brakes, and to reverse while on the ground. Other specialised aeroplanes have contra-rotating propellers which are two propellers driven from the same engine in opposite directions to allow for maximum thrust in high speed propeller based aircraft. Another specialised propeller design is counter-rotating propellers, these are used in twin or quad engine aircraft, and the propellers on each wing rotate in opposing directions, whereas general aeroplanes rotate in the same direction. The main limitation of propellers is the maximum speed. As the outer edge of the propeller achieves mach 1, or the speed of sound , the performance of the propeller decreases significantly and the noise generated increases significantly. This generally occurs as the aeroplane is travelling at speeds of

around 800 kilometres per hour. The fastest propeller based aeroplane is the Tupolev Tu-95 bear; this uses 4 contra-rotating propellers, and achieved the world speed record with an average speed of 871Km/h on a 1000 Km circuit. A propeller based aeroplane can have 2 types of engines, a conventional piston engine, or a turboprop engine. Unlike a conventional engine the turboprop it is designed purely to power aircraft propellers. A turboprop engine uses a gas turbine to drive the propeller, air is sucked into the engine at the front, compressed in the compressor, fuel is added to the compressed air, the air and fuel mixture is then ignited in the combustion chamber where the increase of pressure resulting from the combustion spins the turbine to drive the propeller. This is similar to the design of rotary engines used in many other applications such as in some sports cars. Helicopters also work using the principle of a propeller, although the propeller is used to create the lift for the aircraft, rather than the propulsion, although propulsion is achieved by tilting the nose of the helicopter towards the ground to allow the force being exerted by the rotation of the blades to have both horizontal and vertical components, therefore allowing the helicopter to move forwards. The altitude and speed of the helicopter is controlled by rotating the pitch of the blades, allowing the rotation speed to remain constant.

There are 2 main types of gas turbine jet engines, turbofans; which are used primarily in passenger aircraft, and turbojets; which are used in fighters and high speed aircraft. Gas turbine engines operate similarly to turboprop engines, they suck in air which is then compressed then ignit ed to expand rapidly, although this high pressure gas is then passed out the rear of the engine to propel the aeroplane forwards, instead of being used to drive the propeller. The main difference between turboprops and the turbofans used in passenger aircraft is that turbofans use a fan at the front of the engine to suck the air into the compressor, and the force of the high pressure gasses after the ignition is what generates the thrust from the engine. The nozzle at the rear of the engine then compresses the gasses further to improve the efficiency of the engine and to increase the output.

Turbojet gas turbine engines are the original type of jet engines and are much simpler than turbofan engines, although they work using the same principle. Air is collected, compressed, combusted, then released through a nozzle to propel the aircraft forwards. The main advantage of a turbojet engine over a turbofan engine is the simplicity and cost. Turbojet engines are much less economic than turbofan engines, but are smaller and lighter and can therefore have a much higher power to weight ratio. Turbojet engines can also use afterburner systems which inject fuel into the exhaust gasses in a combustion chamber, then ignite these gasses to utilise the energy lost in the tu rbojet s design, the inefficiency of the design means that the exhaust often contains unspent hydrocarbons which are ignited in the afterburner system. A ramjet engine is similar to a gas turbine jet engine, with the key difference that it has no turbine to draw in the air from the atmosphere and therefore relies on the force of the air against the intake to power the projectile. Ramjet engines can therefore not start without any existing forward velocity, meaning they are used primarily in projectiles such as missiles. They require a relative wind speed of 1000Km/h before they can be used efficiently due to the low compression achieved below this speed. They are a relatively simple design of engine, air is compressed by the force of the intake, fuel is add ed then combusted then released through the nozzle. Ramjet engines are also being used in artillery systems to extend the range of the projectile, and as tip jets on helicopters to increase the speed of the rotation of the helicopter s blades. Ramjets run most efficiently at mach 3 but can run at speeds up to mach 6, allowing them to be used in high speed projectile systems. Ramjets are very efficient systems as they generally have only 1 moving part, the fuel pump, meaning that they can be used at much hig her temperatures and therefore speeds than conventional jet systems. A variation of the ramjet design is the scramjet, which stands for supersonic combustion ramjet. Unlike conventional ramjets the scramjet compresses the air without slowing the surrounding air to subsonic speeds, meaning the engine runs much more efficiently at high speeds. The airflow through a scramjet system is entirely supersonic meaning the engine can run at much higher speeds than a conventional ramjet engine design, at theoretical speeds of up to mach 24 which is approximately 29 000 km/h, Or 8 Km/s. The Boeing

X-51 is an experimental aircraft built with a scramjet engine and achieved a speed of mach 6 on its test flight on May 26 2010. There are around 30 types of rocket engines, the simplest being a water rocket, also known as a bottle rocket, all rockets function using the same principle as jet engines, that as a propellant is ejected at a high velocity the projectile will travel opposing that direction, this is a function of New ton's 3rd law. The difference in rocket engines to jet engines and ramjets is that they need no external supply of materials such as oxygen. The most well known type of commercial rocket is a liquid bipropellant rocket, most often using liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen as the propellants; these are injected into the combustion chamber at high pressure and ignited to allow the expansion of the resulting exhaust gasses in order to propel the projectile forwards. An example of the use of rockets in aeroplanes is in the new Virgin VSS Enterprise SpaceShipTwo suborbital spaceship, it is lifted by it s WhiteKnightTwo mothership, which runs on 4 turbofan jet engines, which carries SpaceShipTwo to an altitude of 14km before allowing the suborbital spaceship ascend to over 140km, and to accelerate to a proposed speed of 4000km/h using it s hybrid rocket engine which runs on both a liquid and solid propellant.