Hypersonic Vehicles/Scramjets

sandeepdg

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Thats why the Bhramos is already working on it....
Brahmos is working on a hypersonic cruise missile ! The HSTD project does not envisages a hypersonic missile but something of a sort a hypersonic long range bomber type of vehicle ! I think that the Brahmos hypersonic missile and the HSTD project are entirely different ...
 

SATISH

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Brahmos is working on a hypersonic cruise missile ! The HSTD project does not envisages a hypersonic missile but something of a sort a hypersonic long range bomber type of vehicle ! I think that the Brahmos hypersonic missile and the HSTD project are entirely different ...
In the end it is the development of a scramjet engine technology. This technology is the building block for any hypersonic cost effective vehicle.
 
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http://www.ptinews.com/news/584912_India-developing-winged-reusable-rocket---ISRO

India developing winged reusable rocket : ISRO

Bangalore, Mar 28 (PTI) India is developing a winged reusable rocket and the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has configured a Technology Demonstrator as a first step towards realising it, the space agency said in a report.

India's space scientists have already configured a winged Reusable Launch Vehicle Technology Demonstrator (RLV-TD). This is a first step towards realising a Two Stage To Orbit (TSTO) fully re-reusable launch vehicle, according to Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).

The agency said in its latest annual report that a series of technology demonstration missions have been conceived.

"The RLV-TD will act as a flying test bed to evaluate various technologies like hypersonic flight, autonomous landing, powered cruise flight and hypersonic flight using air breathing propulsion. First in the series of demonstration trials is the hypersonic flight experiment (HEX)," it said.
 

xebex

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So it seems the ISRO version of reusable launch vehicle will have a vertical launch and DRDO's version will have horizontal take off. sweet!
 
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http://www.space-travel.com/reports/India_Developing_Winged_Reusable_Rocket_999.html

India Developing Winged Reusable Rocket

India is developing a winged reusable rocket and the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has configured a Technology Demonstrator as a first step towards realising it, the space agency said in a report.

India's space scientists have already configured a winged Reusable Launch Vehicle Technology Demonstrator (RLV-TD). This is a first step towards realising a Two Stage To Orbit (TSTO) fully re-reusable launch vehicle, according to Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).

The agency said in its latest annual report that a series of technology demonstration missions have been conceived.

"The RLV-TD will act as a flying test bed to evaluate various technologies like hypersonic flight, autonomous landing, powered cruise flight and hypersonic flight using air breathing propulsion. First in the series of demonstration trials is the hypersonic flight experiment (HEX)," it said.

Meanwhile, for the Chandrayaan-2 mission, expected by 2012-13, ISRO has received 36 Indian payload proposals for orbiter and lander/rover.

The Scientific Advisory Board of Chandrayaan-2, a follow-on mission to Chandrayaan-1, is currently in the process of reviewing the payloads proposed for orbiter.

ISRO sources said the space agency has also received foreign proposals evincing interest to send their instruments for hosting by the Chandrayaan-2 which would be jointly developed with Russia.

It would have an Indian orbiter and mini-rover, and Russian lander and rover.

According to ISRO, the Megha-Tropiques satellite, an Indo-French joint mission for the study of the tropical atmosphere and climate related aspects, is expected to be launched later this year.

It is set to join a string of global spacecraft designated to study climate change.

"Considering the strong global demand for data from Megha-Tropiques, ISRO, CNES (French space agency) and NASA have agreed to integrate this satellite into Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) constellation of satellites," ISRO said.

"With this, Megha-Tropiques will be one of the eight satellites contributing to the global scientific community to study and understand the dynamics of climate system," it said.

Data from the recently-launched Oceansat-2, which carried an atmospheric sounder 'ROSA' from Italy apart from main payloads - ocean colour monitor and scatterometer - is highly sought after by international scientific community.

In this respect, a cooperative programme on sharing the data with National Aeronautics and Space Administration
and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for their operational research is expected to be signed shortly, it said.
 

nrj

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X-51 & Falcon HTV-2 tests very near....

Hypersonic proponents worldwide will eagerly watch two long-awaited technology demonstrations starting with the imminent first flight attempt for the X-51 Waverider, to be followed within a month by the first flight of the Falcon HTV-2 hypersonic test vehicle.

Successful flights for both are seen as critical to proving the practicality of hypersonic technology for high-speed weapon, reconnaissance and space-access applications. The X-51 is a Mach 6+vehicle powered by a hydrocarbon fuel-cooled scramjet, and could perform the longest duration air-breathing hypersonic flight in history. The HTV-2 is an unpowered hypersonic glider aimed at gathering rare performance data.


Researchers say success in at least one of the four planned X-51 flights, the first of which could come as soon as Mar. 18, will reinforce the case for follow-on development. The HTV-2 will be boosted on a Minotaur IV Lite from Vandenberg AFB, Calif., to an impact near the Reagan Test Site at Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands. A launch is planned within an 8-day window—Apr. 20-27.

Preparations for the first flight of the X-51, a joint effort involving the Air Force, Whitney Rocketdyne and Boeing, are now complete, says Boeing X-51 program manager Joe Vogel. “The vehicle is ready to go and we’re ready to make it happen.” Originally expected to fly in late October 2009, the test has slipped mainly because of availability of the B-52H carrier aircraft that will launch the X-51 over the Pacific.

Two captive-carry tests were flown in December and January, the second of which “threaded the eye of the storm” through successive weather fronts to fly out over the Point Mugu, Calif.-controlled test range, from which the X-51 will be launched at 50,000 ft. “We can’t fly on a rainy day,” adds Vogel. That is not because of weather; it is done to control test parameters.

Two test vehicles are complete with “just close-out work to do,” Vogel says. The remaining pair, which may have updated guidance software to test possible hypersonic navigation, will be ready “in the next couple of months. We’ve got a lot of confidence it’s going to work as we hope it will,” he adds.

The flight of the Lockheed Martin-built HTV-2 is the first of two planned from Vandenberg. April’s flight, originally due in May 2009, will be followed by a second later this year to evaluate cross-range maneuvering capability and the thermal protection system. The ability of the GPS/INS-guided navigation system to acquire signals through plasma will also be vetted.

The HTV-2 program will be the first beneficiary of an upgrade to the Air Force’s Hypervelocity Wind Tunnel 9 in White Oak, Md. Following a 14-month refurbishment to install a new control system and instrumentation, an HTV-2 model is being used for initial runs of the facility, capable of conducting aerodynamic and aerothermal tests at speeds up to Mach 14.

“Instead of using the traditional 7-deg. cone, we chose the HTV because the complexity of its 3D geometry drives the physics and provides the perfect testbed for us to look at hard problems,” says Dan Marren, director of the White Oak site, which is part of the USAF’s Arnold Engineering Development Center. “After they fly, they’ll come back here to understand what they see in flight.”

Refurbishment has upgraded the facility to a fully digital control system for increased test accuracy, but the biggest change is a new suite of advanced instrumentation that enables the tunnel to be used to investigate the physics of hypersonic flight. Marren says Tunnel 9 had been used mainly to test systems close to being fielded, such as the Theater High-Altitude Area Defense interceptor.

The facility is the highest-pressure wind tunnel in the world, he says, operating at up to 30,000 psi. and temperatures up to 3,500F. The 5-ft.-dia. test cell uses electrically heated nitrogen as the working fluid. Unlike hypersonic shock tunnels, which only run for milliseconds, Tunnel 9 can run at Mach 14 for 1 sec. at high pressures and 15 sec. at low, allowing the model to be moved during a run, changing angle of attack, for example.

The tunnel can replicate the boundary-layer physics of hypersonic vehicles, enabling investigation of the transition between laminar and turbulent flow and the resulting increased heating. The new instrumentation will be key in these investigations.

Special paint on the model is viewed via thermal imager to determine surface temperatures. The HTV-2 tests will be the first time this is used on a model that changes pitch during a run, Marren says. New sensors measure both pressures and frequencies to determine the state of the boundary layer, while focused Schlieren imaging is correlated with the pressure measurements to look closely at the boundary layer and see what is causing the transition to turbulent flow.

Data from the first run of the refurbished Tunnel 9, on Mar. 4, were “outstanding,” says Marren.

Source
 
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CROSS POSTED

http://www.flightglobal.com/article...ns-delayed-scramjet-flight-test-for-2010.html

India plans delayed scramjet flight test for 2010

India's first scramjet technology demonstrator will be flight-tested next year, four years later than planned and having failed to meet two previous targets, by the government-run Defence Research and Development Laboratory in Hyderabad.

The Indian military wants to use scramjet systems for a hypersonic missile. The first demonstrator flight test will be carried out at India's integrated test range on its east coast.

Flight International revealed in 2004 that the country had planned a 2006 scramjet test. When that failed to take place, Israel Aerospace Industries announced in 2007 it was helping India develop the technology for a first flight in 2008.

"The biggest challenge [will] be how to sustain stable combustion during the high-speed trans-atmospheric flight of the vehicle," says sources at the Indian government's Defence Research and Development Organisation, under which the laboratory operates.

India has longer-term plans to use scramjet technology for its proposed 25,000kg (55,000lb) spaceplane called Avatar, the Sanskrit word for a god who appears in bodily form on Earth. The spaceplane would ferry civilian and military satellites of about 1,000kg into a low Earth orbit.
 
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http://www.space-travel.com/reports/Hypersonic_Test_Vehicle_Mission_Lost_After_Nine_Minutes_999.html

Hypersonic Test Vehicle Mission Lost After Nine Minutes

US military scientists lost contact with a hypersonic glider nine minutes into its inaugural test flight last week, a defence research agency said on Tuesday. The unmanned Falcon Hypersonic Technology Vehicle 2 is designed to fly through the upper reaches of Earth's atmosphere at speeds of up to Mach 20, providing the US military with a possible platform for striking targets anywhere on the planet with conventional weapons.

The HTV-2 was launched last week aboard a Minotaur IV rocket from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, according to the Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency.

The test flight called for a 30-minute mission in which the vehicle would glide at high speed
before splashing down in the Pacific Ocean, north of a US military test site at the Kwajalein Atoll.

The glider separated from the booster but soon after the signal vanished, a spokeswoman said.

"Preliminary review of data indicates the HTV-2 achieved controlled flight within the atmosphere at over Mach 20. Then contact with HTV-2 was lost," Johanna Spangenberg Jones, a spokeswoman for DARPA, told AFP.

"This was our first flight (all others were done in wind tunnels and simulations) so although of course we would like to have everything go perfectly, we still gathered data and can use findings for the next flight, scheduled currently for early 2011," she said in an email.

The test flight was supposed to cover a total of 4100 nautical miles (7600 kilometres) from lift-off and scientists had hoped to conduct some limited maneuvers, with the HTV-2 banking and eventually diving for its splash down.

US aerospace giant Lockheed Martin builds the hypersonic glider, which the military calls "revolutionary."

The hypersonic program appears to fit in with US plans to develop a way of hitting distant targets with conventional weapons within an hour, dubbed "prompt global strike."

According to a Pentagon fact sheet for the vehicle, "the US military seeks the capability to respond, with little or no advanced warning, to threats to our national security anywhere around the globe."

A hypersonic plane could substitute for a ballistic missile armed with a conventional warhead, as other countries might suspect the missile represented a nuclear attack.

"Aside from its speed, another advantage is that it would not be mistaken by Russia or China for a nuclear launch," said Loren Thompson, an analyst with the Lexington Institute who has done consultant work for Lockheed Martin.

The US Air Force has also looked at hypersonic vehicles for intelligence-gathering if spy satellites in low orbit were attacked, he said.
 
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cross posted

http://in.news.yahoo.com/139/20100427/888/twl-us-s-hypersonic-falcon-missile-test_1.html

US's hypersonic Falcon missile test a dud?



Washington, Apr 27(ANI): The Pentagon's test launch of an experimental hypersonic space vehicle last week aimed to develop a new generation of high-altitude weapon systems is being considered a dud.

The United States Air Force (USAF) and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) had test launched the Hypersonic Technology Vehicle 2 (HTV-2), known as the Falcon, at the Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.

One part of the program aimed to develop a reusable, rapid-strike Hypersonic Cruise Vehicle (HCV), while the other was for the development of a launch system capable of accelerating a HCV to cruise speeds, as well as launching small satellites into Earth orbit.

The Falcon was believed to be a part of the Pentagon's effort to develop the capability to strike anywhere in the world with a conventional warhead in less than an hour - known as Conventional Prompt Global Strike.

The test vehicle launched last week reached Mach 5 on launch, and was designed to crash and sink into the sea and sink near Kwajalein Atoll, 2,000 miles of Hawaii, 30 minutes later and 4,000 miles from the launch site.

However a DARPA statement released last Friday indicates that all was not perfect with the hypersonic craft.

"Approximately nine minutes into the mission, telemetry assets experienced a loss of signal from the HTV-2. An engineering team is reviewing available data to understand this event," The Fox News quoted the statement, as saying.

The statement does not specify whether the Falcon completed any of the test maneuvers before controllers lost communications with the craft.

Meanwhile, conspiracy theorists believe that the Falcon seems to be the culmination of the secret project known as "Aurora", a hypersonic spy plane capable of speeds up to Mach 6 (3,700 mph). (ANI)
 
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http://www.space-travel.com/reports...quid_Methane_Rocket_Engine_Completed_999.html

Altitude Testing Of Aerojet Advanced Liquid Oxygen/Liquid Methane Rocket Engine Completed

Aerojet has announced that NASA has successfully completed altitude testing of Aerojet's advanced 5500-lbf Liquid Oxygen (LOX)/Liquid Methane (LCH4) Rocket Engine at NASA's White Sands Test Facility (WSTF). The 5500-lbf LO2/LCH4 engine development effort is funded by the Propulsion and Cryogenics Advanced Development Project (PCAD) under NASA's Exploration Technology Development
Program.

The first-generation Aerojet LO2/LCH4 engine, operating at WSTF, is shown in Figure 1 at T + 40 seconds when the engine assembly has reached steady state thermal equilibrium. The engine, as tested at WSTF, demonstrated a specific impulse (Isp) of 345.2 seconds, and based upon an Aerojet extrapolation of the data to a flight type configuration, it would be capable of producing a specific impulse (Isp) of 350 seconds.

Multiple vehicle study activities have shown that a cryogenic LOX/LCH4 propellant combination provides advantages for long-duration storage in space and the ability to be extended for future missions to Mars. This propellant combination is also being studied as a promising option for other deep-space missions due to potential savings in overall systems mass when compared to conventional propellant (hypergolic) systems.


This technology development program's objective is to provide risk reduction data for this new and novel non-toxic propellant combination. The Aerojet 5500-lbf LOX/LCH4 rocket engine program has provided critical data in both sea-level and high-area-ratio nozzle altitude testing.

Aerojet completed a sea-level testing campaign of more than 50 hot-fire tests of this advanced engine and more than 769 seconds of total duration in the summer of 2009. The sea-level testing campaign was concluded at Aerojet with successful completion of a continuous ablative chamber test firing for 110 seconds.

This test was conducted to obtain the ablative chamber char rates and anchor Aerojet thermal analysis codes for the altitude chamber design.

After refurbishment, the sea-level injector was delivered to NASA's WSTF Test Cell 401 for assembly into the altitude test facility.

The altitude engine assembly consists of igniter and injector propellant valves, an altitude ablative chamber and a columbium nozzle extension. The Aerojet altitude engine completed the altitude test matrix, which consisted of eight tests at different mixture ratios and durations. Initial hot fire data and performance data reduction analyses have been completed. Mark Klem, program manager of NASA's Propulsion and Cryogenics Advanced Development (PCAD) program said, "This testing has provided us with extremely valuable altitude test data to improve the database and design tools for liquid oxygen/liquid methane engines. The NASA and Aerojet team should be complimented on their hard work to provide these data and design tools that are needed to take us a step closer to designing a flight engine."
 
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SHASH2K2

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Boeing X-51A Waverider Scramjet Set to Fly

http://www.armedforces-int.com/news/boeing_x51a_waverider_scramjet_set_to_fly.html


Boeing X-51A Waverider Scramjet Set to Fly
Posted by Armed Forces International's Aviation Expert on 25/05/2010 - 11:20:00
The Boeing X-51A Waverider's first flight is expected shortly

A new US military hypersonic technology platform is set to take to the skies on 25 May 2010. Defence and aerospace firm Boeing's X-51A Waverider is a pilotless scramjet – a supersonic ramjet capable of attaining speeds in excess of Mach 7.

The X-51A's roots lie in earlier hypersonic US military designs such as the Advanced Rapid Response Missile Demonstrator, and it gained its alpha-numeric designation in 2005.

Previously, it's been carried into the air under the wing of a USAF B-52 Stratofortress four-engined strategic bomber, but not released. Today, it's expected to be released approximately 50,000 feet above the Pacific Ocean, and while it probably won't reach Mach 7 initially, it will likely attain speeds near the upper edge of its capabilities.
X-51A Waverider First Flight

The X-51A' Waverider's first flight is scheduled to last for only around five minutes but – during this time – it will reach approximately 70,000 feet and key flight data will be sent to analysts on the ground. At the end of the flight, the scramjet will touch down in the Pacific.

The Waverider features a long, thin fuselage and tiny winglets. This design allows it to effectively ride the shockwave it produces with minimal drag and – at the height it will be operating at – to blend atmospheric air with jet fuel.
Boeing X-51A: Hypersonic Aircraft

The Boeing X-51A is a joint venture between Boeing Phantom Works (the firm's principal research and development division) and Pratt and Whitney: an engine manufacturer whose products feature in multiple different military and civilian aircraft designs. Funding for the hypersonic aircraft project comes from a combination of the USAF, NASA and Darpa (the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency).

Limited data has emerged on this unmanned technology demonstrator, but according to Global Security, it is 26 feet in length and weighs in the region of 4,000 pounds.

Hypersonic speeds of the kind that the Boeing Waverider is expected to attain are defined as those that surpass Mach 5.

According to the USAF, the X-51A project could act as the gateway to future hypersonic weapons programmes.
 

SHASH2K2

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India has flight tested a sounding rocket that will be the vehicle used to carry the countries scramjet technology prototypes. The Indian Space Research Organisation's press release is here. This news article says the rocket achieved a speed of more than Mach 6.5 and this media report says it was conducted from ISRO's spaceport Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh, northeast of Chennai

http://www.flightglobal.com/blogs/hyperbola/2010/03/india-tests-scramjet-test-vehi.html
 

SHASH2K2

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India plans delayed scramjet flight test for 2010
By Radhakrishna Rao

India's first scramjet technology demonstrator will be flight-tested next year, four years later than planned and having failed to meet two previous targets, by the government-run Defence Research and Development Laboratory in Hyderabad.

The Indian military wants to use scramjet systems for a hypersonic missile. The first demonstrator flight test will be carried out at India's integrated test range on its east coast.

Flight International revealed in 2004 that the country had planned a 2006 scramjet test. When that failed to take place, Israel Aerospace Industries announced in 2007 it was helping India develop the technology for a first flight in 2008.

"The biggest challenge [will] be how to sustain stable combustion during the high-speed trans-atmospheric flight of the vehicle," says sources at the Indian government's Defence Research and Development Organisation, under which the laboratory operates.

India has longer-term plans to use scramjet technology for its proposed 25,000kg (55,000lb) spaceplane called Avatar, the Sanskrit word for a god who appears in bodily form on Earth. The spaceplane would ferry civilian and military satellites of about 1,000kg into a low Earth
 

SHASH2K2

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Scientists at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) of Bangalore along with Indian defence agencies are in the process of developing a technology which is hitherto unavailable in any other country. The Indian scientists are developing technology to build recoverable hypersonic missiles which will have the potential of hitting a target over 5,000 kilometres away at more than five times the speed of sound (Mach 5) and can also be used to launch satellites at economical costs.

Scientists revealed that the recoverable hypersonic missile will be half the size of the current missiles but no time-frame has been finalized for the project. The recoverable missile will be like an aircraft which can come back to its base after dropping the weapon. The missile will not be as big as other ballistic missiles and will achieve target over 5,000 kilometres away. Currently, India's longest-range missile, Agni III, is capable of hitting targets 3,500 km away.

Sources revealed that the state-owned Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) is discreetly working on this technology which is in its nascent stage and that IISc working on some parts of this intercontinental ballistic missile. Apparently, a technology developed by IISc will be used on this missile that has the potential to increase the range of missiles and satellite launch vehicles by at least 40%. The enhanced range is made possible by adding a special-purpose coating of chromium metal to the blunt nose cone of missiles and launch vehicles.
 

SHASH2K2

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US Air Force and Boeing researchers on 26 May took a leap towards harnessing hypersonic vehicles for space access or weapons applications with the longest-ever supersonic combustion ramjet-powered flight, off the southern California Pacific coast.

The Boeing Phantom Works-built X-51A Waverider achieved 140s burn of its Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne-built air breathing scramjet engine and accelerated to 70,000ft (21,350m) and Mach 5 before controllers at the Point Mugu naval air warfare centre sea range terminated the mission because of a loss of telemetry.

The previous longest scramjet burn in a flight test was 12s in a hydrogen-based engine in the NASA X-43.

The X-51A was carried to about 49,500ft under the wing of a Boeing B-52H before release. Four seconds later an Army Tactical Missile solid rocket booster accelerated the X-51 to about M4.8 before it and a connecting interstage were jettisoned.

b52H
© U.S. Air Force photo/Mike Cassidy
An X-51A Waverider successfully launched from a B-52 Stratofortress

Air Force Research Laboratory X-51A programme manager Charlie Brink says preliminary data shows that the separation from the B-52H was "phenomenal" and the solid booster light was "perfect". At 65,000ft the booster separated from the vehicle as planned, followed by the start of the scramjet engine with an ethylene mix and switchover to JP-7 fuel.

While the programme had a goal for a 300s flight to M6, Brink says that at roughly 140s of powered flight, engineers "started noticing some anomalies with some sensors". The engine continued to run, but the telemetry stream to the ground was interrupted, requiring controllers to activate the self-destruct function.

Despite the shorter flight, the team was exhilarated over the results. "Up until 140s, everything was working textbook, per calculations", says Joe Vogel, Boeing's X-51A programme manager.

In M5-plus hypersonic flight, heat and pressure make conventional turbine engines impractical. A scramjet's great advantage is the ability to capture and burn oxygen in thin atmosphere, rather than having to carry it in a large tank like other rockets. Not having to carry the oxidizer needed for combustion means more payload capability.

Brink says engineers will review data for the rest of the fiscal year and the programme is likely to pick up with flight tests in October or November, incorporating any required lessons learned from the 26 May flight.



The X-51A was released from under the B-52's wing at 49,500ft

http://www.flightglobal.com/articles/2010/05/27/342468/pictures.html
 

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