DEPARTMENT OF AUTOMOBILE AND MECHANICAL ENGINEERING

IOE, THAPATHALI CAMPUS

TURBO MACHINE
CHAPTER 5
JET PROPULSION SYSYEM

1 Instructor : Achyut Paudel

Email: [email protected]
Ph: 9841263367
 JET PROPULSION
 Turbine Powered
 Turbo Jet
 Turbo Fan

 Ram Powered
 Pure Ramjets
 Scramjets, Air turboramjet, Bussard Ramjet

 Non- Continuous Combustion

 Pulsejets (Deflagration Engine)
 PDE (Pulsed Detonation Engines)

 Rocket Propulsion
 Hybrid Engines
 Combined Cycles Engines
 Advanced Propulsion 2
 RAMJETS
 Also called Athodyd (Aerothermodynamic Duct), Lorin Tube or
flying stovepipe.
 Ramjet engines have an inlet diffuser, a combustion chamber with
nozzles for feeding fuel, an ignition device, a flame holder, and an
exhaust nozzle

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ASSUMPTIONS OF IDEAL RAMJET ENGINES
 The dissipation of kinetic energy and thermal
energy are absent.
 The pressures in the inlet and in the exhaust
sections are equal to the back pressure
 The stagnation pressure does not vary during
heating
 The working substance is an ideal gas the specific
heat of which is constant.

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 IDEAL RAMJET STATION NUMBERS
 Between stations 0 and 2 isentropic (reversible and adiabatic)
diffusion and compression with a decrease in Mach number (M2 <<
1).
 Between stations 2 and 3 there is constant pressure combustion,
according to the ideal Brayton cycle.
 Between stations 3 and 4 ideal expansion through the nozzle (p4 =
p0). There are no moving or rotating parts, so there are no
mechanical losses to take into account. The working fluid inside the
engine is air, which is assumed to behave as a perfect gas with
constant specific heats.

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IDEAL RAMJET CYCLE ANALYSIS (BRAYTON)

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 Subsonic combustion ramjets have combustor low velocities M2
usually taken between 0.3 and 0.35, and for ideal performance
analysis the pressure remains constant (Brayton cycle). The low
velocity is necessary to keep the flame holders from blowing out,
meaning the flames deattach from the flame holders.
 The flow velocity after combustion is larger then before combustion,
but still smaller than unity M2 < M3 << 1. The ratio of the
temperature at the inlet and the temperature at the exit is needed
to find the thrust.
 Since there is no downstream turbine, a ramjet combustor can
safely operate at stoichiometric fuel:air ratios, which implies a
combustor exit stagnation temperature of the order of 2,400 K
(2,130 °C; 3,860 °F) for kerosene. Normally, the combustor must be
capable of operating over a wide range of throttle settings, for a
range of flight speeds/altitudes.
 A ramjet needs to move forward to develop thrust and is dependent
on the ram compression of the incoming air flow. Efficient
compression of the incoming flow requires high enough velocities. 7
 RAMJETS
 Advantages
 No moving parts
 Light in weight
 Wide variety of fuels ( hydrogen , hydrocarbons etc)

 Disadvantages
 Cannot start of its own, requires a launching device to
attain certain velocity. So a ramjet is equipped usually
with a turbojet.
 High fuel consumption at low Mach no.
 Complicated Intake and Diffuser design and matching
 Combustion Instability/ requirements of flame holders
 Structural limits are for instance the melting temperature
or maximum internal pressure of a material or
construction determined by the combustor stagnation
temperature T for a chosen material,
t3
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SUPERSONIC COMBUSTION RAMJET (SCRAMJET)

NASA X-43A with Scramjet engine underside 9

SCRAMJET
 Ramjet operating in the hypersonic regime must
operate with supersonic combustion and without
normal shock waves to avoid reaching unnecessary
high heat transfer and structural loads.
 Scramjet engines operate on the same principles as
ramjets, but do not decelerate the flow to subsonic
velocities.
 Scramjet combustor is supersonic: the inlet is
supersonic and decelerates the flow to a lower Mach
number for combustion, after which it is accelerated
to an even higher Mach number through the nozzle.
 By limiting the amount of deceleration, temperatures
within the engine are kept at a tolerable level, from
both a material and combustive standpoint.
 Even so, current scramjet technology requires the use
of high-energy fuels and active cooling schemes to
maintain sustained operation, often
using hydrogen and regenerative cooling techniques 10
 INTERMITTENT COMBUSTION ENGINES
Deflagration vs. Detonation
 Deflagration is a term describing subsonic combustion
propagating through heat transfer; hot burning material heats the
next layer of cold material and ignites it.
 Detonation is a type of combustion involving a supersonic
exothermic front accelerating through a medium that eventually
drives a shock front propagating directly in front of it.

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AIR BREATHING JET ENGINES

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 PULSE JET ENGINE
 Pulsejets are very simple devices where flow comes in through
valves. When the combustion is initiated, the flow goes to high
temperature and pressure and the flow is evacuated through a
nozzle, which could be a convergent or a convergent divergent
nozzle. As it is evacuated, these valves are forced open and the flow
comes in. The cycle is repeated.

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 PULSE JET CYCLE
 The combustion event begins when the combustion chamber pressure is
above atmospheric and the temperature of the fuel/air mixture
increases, due to mixing with residual products, to the auto ignition
temperature.
 A compression wave is generated and combustion increases both
temperature and pressure in the combustion chamber, driving the flow
toward the exit and inlet at gradually increasing velocity.
 The relatively short combustion event ends and when the compression
wave reaches either the pulsejet inlet or the exit, an expansion wave due
to overexpansion and travels back into the combustion chamber.
 Flow velocity reaches its positive maximum at the exit at this time. The
expansion wave decreases the pressure in the exhaust tube and the
combustion chamber to sub atmosphere, resulting in backflow at both
the inlet and exit.
 The next charge of air enters into the chamber due to this backflow at
the inlet. The mass addition increases the combustion chamber
pressure. When the pressure in the combustion chamber approaches the
atmosphere pressure, the next cycle begins.
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 pulsejets operate at around 45 to 50 pulses per second. They are very
fast pulses and the jet engine can operate in a pulsating manner to
create almost continuous thrust generation.
 LIMITATIONS
 The fuel injection system, combustion chamber, and the inlet
geometry must be carefully designed to create a fast mixing process
and the necessary fluid dynamic and acoustic time scales to permit
pulsejet operation.
 Another challenge is the heat loss to the walls due to the high
surface-area-to volume ratio. Large thermal losses have a direct
impact on overall combustor efficiency and they can increase
kinetic times and narrow flammability limits through suppression
of the reaction temperatures.
 For the oscillating combustion process to be self-sustaining,
excessive heat loss, which lowers the temperature of the walls and
the residual gas, must be prevented. is generated.

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 PDE (PULSE DETONATION ENGINE)
 A pulse detonation engine, or "PDE", is a type of propulsion
system that uses detonation waves to combust the fuel and oxidizer
mixture.
 Supersonic combustion systems
 Constant volume heat addition

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 PDE CYCLE
 Similar to Brayton cycle except that the heat addition process
occurs at constant volume because combustion takes place so
rapidly, the charge (fuel/air mix) does not have time to expand
during this process.

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 LIMITATIONS
 One of the factors affecting the practical implementation of
PDEs is the difficulty in achieving consistent detonations
within the combustion chamber, within a short tube length.
 Detonation is often difficult to initiate within fuel and air
mixtures in shorter tubes, requiring the addition of large
amounts of energy.
 A more useful method is to start a deflagrative combustion
and then to drive the reaction to a detonation by placing
obstacles within the path that will create turbulent mixing
and also speed up the flow.
 The process of accelerating the pressure wave into a
detonation wave is known as Deflagration to Detonation
Transition (DDT). The most effective DDT inducing object is
the Shchelkin spiral, which is similar to a helical spring.
Other DDT devices include orifice plates and converging- 18
diverging nozzles.
OVERALL COMPARISON

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 ROCKET PROPULSION
 produces a high temperature reaction mass, as a hot gas which
exhausts from high-expansion ratio nozzle to produce thrust.
 Exhaust speeds reaches nearly Mach 10 at sea level
 High specific thrust/ specific impulse
 Commonly called chemical rocket propulsion because of the use of
fuel and oxidizer (oxygen is produced within the engine i.e. pure
chemical rocket engine is non air breathing.)
 Uses: low-cost weapons, space propulsion, aerospace vehicle boost
applications.
 Based on type of propellant (fuel + oxidizer):
 Liquid Propellant
 Gaseous Propellant
 Solid Propellant (Propellant in the form of packed grain)
 Hybrid propellant (fuel is solid, oxidizer is liquid or gas)

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 The figure of merit that compares rockets to air-
breathing engines is the specific impulse Is (in seconds).

 Thrust generated: No ram drag component as air is

produced within the engine

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CHEMICAL ROCKET PROPULSION

Fig: Schematic diagram of a (simplified) chemical rocket

with liquid hydrogen as fuel and liquid oxygen (LO2)as
the oxidizer (with turbo-pump feed system)

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 SOLID PROPELLANT ROCKET ENGINE

Fig: Schematic drawing of a solid-propellant chemical

rocket with internal burning grain

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 ROCKET ENGINE LIMITATIONS
 The main drawback of rocket engines operating in the Earth’s
atmosphere is their high propellant consumption rate per unit thrust
produced as compared to the fuel consumption rate in air-breathing
engines.
 To reach LEO (low earth orbit) and maintain a circular orbit, we need
to fly about Mach 25. For a single-stage to orbit aircraft (what is known
as SSTO), the engine(s) have to produce takeoff thrust, maintain climb
rate, and acceleration until the vehicle has achieved Mach 25. At
takeoff, we could use a turbofan engine and gradually reduce its bypass
ratio (as in a variable-bypass TF engine) with flight Mach number until
it operates as a turbojet. Then, we should be able to shut down the gas
generator all together near Mach 3 and switch over to a conventional (or
subsonic combustion) ramjet for up to ∼Mach 6. The scramjet is to take
over beyond Mach 6 and accelerate the vehicle through Mach 10–15,
depending on the hydrocarbon or hydrogen fuel, respectively. At these
Mach numbers, we are still too slow to maintain a circular orbit at LEO.
Therefore, chemical rocket engines have to be fired for the last leg of our
launch, which should take the vehicle to Mach 25 and low Earth orbit.
The main challenge for such a combination propulsion system (CPS) is
complex system integration into a vehicle and the mechanical
complexities involved in transition from one set or class of engines to
another. This gives rise to a combined cycle engines (CCE or CCPS)or
hybrid engines which is completely different from CPS. 24
 CCPS ENGINES SYSTEMS

 An engine system whose main element is the ramjet/PDE engine

(with subsonic and or supersonic combustion) that is boosted to
ramjet/PDE takeover speed by means of turbo engine ( turbo-
accelerator) or rocket based system and that uses ramjet/PDE
propulsion at the higher speeds.
 A CCPS (combined cycle propulsion system) is defined as a single
propulsion system assembly that has multiple operating modes using
the same propulsion subsystems (compressor, combustor, and nozzle)
interchangeably throughout the flight.
 The first mode of operation is low speed subsystem from Mach 0 to 3,
supersonic subsystem from Mach 3 to 5, hypersonic subsystem from
Mach 5 to 10, and finally the rocket subsystem from Mach 10 to
orbital velocity.
 The basic subsystems are turbofan or turbojets, ramjets or pulsejets,
and rockets.
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 CCPS ENGINE
 Types of CCPS
 Rocket Based Combined cycle (RBCC)
 Turbine Based Combined Cycle (TBCC)
 A typical TBCC propulsion system would utilize a turbofan or turbojet
to produce thrust and accelerate the vehicle from rest to an
intermediate Mach number. A secondary airstream would bypass the
main combustor of the turbojet or turbofan and go to an afterburning
ram duct which provides greater thrust at higher Mach numbers. Once
the vehicle is at supersonic speeds, an inlet shock cone and turbo-
compressor diffuse the air into the ramjet afterburner. A great example
of a TBCC propulsion system, the Pratt & Whitney J-58, is used to
power the supersonic Lockheed Martin SR-71 Blackbird.
 While the TBCC propulsion system would be extremely useful at
relatively low Mach numbers, it is not suitable for use on an SSTO
launch vehicle. In order to use a TBCC propulsion system on an SSTO
vehicle, the fan and turbine components would have to be moved out of
the main flight path and into stowage during high-speed flight through
the atmosphere. However, they would be well suited for applications in
a two-stage-to-orbit (TSTO) vehicle as the lower stage booster. 26
 RBCC is defined as any propulsion system which utilizes a rocket
element as its primary propulsion element in achieving static
thrust and ultimately trans-atmospheric insertion, while
simultaneously using any number of complimentary propulsion
system cycles (usually ramjet) to augment the performance
throughout its mission profile.
 At takeoff where conventional ramjets are incapable of producing
thrust, a rocket is fired (with an ejector nozzle configuration to get a
thrust boost) that accelerates the vehicle to, say, Mach 2. At Mach
2, the rocket is turned off and air intakes are opened to start a
subsonic ramjet engine operation. The air-breathing engine
switches from the subsonic to supersonic combustion ramjet
(scramjet) near Mach 5. The scramjet will accelerate the vehicle to,
say, Mach 15. The air intakes close at Mach 15 and rocket operation
resumes accelerating the vehicle to orbital speeds (∼Mach 25 or
higher).
 Also known as rocket based air-breathing propulsion. 27
 Example: SABRE (synergetic air breathing rocket engine)
RBCC IN PROPULSION

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OTHER VARIANTS OF CCPS
 PDTE (Pulsed detonation turbofan engine)
 TRCC ( Turbo rocket combined cycle)

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