Development status of a hypersonic precooled turbojet engine

Paper number

IAC-09.C4.5.1

Author

Prof. Tetsuya Sato, Waseda University, Japan

Coauthor

Dr. Hideyuki Taguchi, Japan

Coauthor

Dr. Hiroaki Kobayashi, Japan

Coauthor

Dr. Takayuki Kojima, Japan

Coauthor

Dr. Daisaku Masaki, Japan

Coauthor

Mr. Motoyuki Hongoh, Japan

Coauthor

Dr. Kenya Harada, Japan

Coauthor

Dr. Keiichi Okai, Japan

Coauthor

Dr. Kazuhisa Fujita, Japan

Coauthor

Prof. Shujiro Sawai, Japan

Year

2009

Abstract

This paper shows the development status of the subscale precooled turbojet engine conducted by JAXA. A turbine-based combined cycle system (TBCC) is one of the promising candidates for the propulsion system for low cost, high reliability and routine access to space. We proposed and developed a precooled-cycle turbojet engines using liquid hydrogen as fuel and coolant for the first stage of the TSTO space plane and the hypersonic cruiser. This engine can operate from take-off to Mach 6 at 26 km of altitude continuously without mode transition.

At present, a subscale engine “S-engine” is under development, which has 23 cm x 23 cm of rectangular cross section, 2.6 m of the overall length and about 100 kg of the target weight employing composite materials for a variable-geometry rectangular inlet and nozzle. The design thrust and specific impulse at SLS are 1.2 kN and 2060 sec respectively. After the system design and component tests, a prototype engine (metal engine) was manufactured and provided for three times of ground firing tests using gaseous and/or liquid hydrogen.  The third test series PCTJ-3 was successfully conducted in October 2008 at JAXA Taiki Aerospace Research Field. 

Several fundamental studies have also been conducted such as a wind tunnel test of the buzz characteristics on the air inlet, a system optimization of the hypersonic vehicle using the PCTJ and so on.

The flight test of the S-engine is to be conducted by the Balloon-based Operation Vehicle (BOV) in 2010 . The vehicle is about 5 m in length, 0.55 m in diameter and 500 kg in weight. Originally, BOV was design as a test bed for micro gravity experiments. Two micro gravity experiments were successfully conducted in May 2006 and May 2007 respectively. S-engine will be installed and tested on the third one (BOV-3) . The vehicle is dropped from an altitude of 30-40 km by a high altitude balloon. After 40-second free-fall, the vehicle pulls up and S-engine operates for 30 seconds up to Mach 1.8.

Abstract document

IAC-09.C4.5.1.pdf

Manuscript document

IAC-09.C4.5.1.pdf (🔒 authorized access only).

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