News Reaction Engines News

[Notebook]

March News:

Reaction Engines Wins Three Technology Strategy Board Awards

http://www.reactionengines.co.uk/news_mar11.html

N.

 

[orb]

SPACE.com: Big Test Looms for British Space Plane Concept:

SAN FRANCISCO — A huge, unmanned British space plane is on pace to start launching payloads into Earth orbit in less than a decade — provided it can pass a crucial engine test in June, its designers say.

The Skylon space plane — which would take off and land horizontally, like a commercial jet — is still a concept vehicle for now, but it recently passed several rigorous independent design reviews, the British company Reaction Engines Ltd, which is developing the spacecraft, announced Tuesday (April 12).

Private funding is lined up to see it through all stages of development, culminating with the start of commercial operations in 2020. That funding, however, is contingent on Skylon hitting some key milestones along the way, and a big one looms just a few months off.

In June, the Abingdon, Oxfordshire-based Reaction Engines plans to test a component of its revolutionary hybrid jet/rocket engine. On the line is $350 million in investor funding — and perhaps the future of the project.

{...}

 

[Fabri91]

Thanks for the update.
If all goes well and the schedule is manageable (although a bit optimistic I think) it could mean we are less than ten years away from a Single Stage to Orbit spaceplane.

I know it might sound obvious but it definetly makes an impression to read that such a project seems doable and is being actively worked on.

 

[Izack]

That sounds encouraging, though I wonder how hopeful I should let myself get. :shifty:

 

[Notebook]

A tenuous link, but somwhere in this image is a connection:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-13085653

N.

 

[Notebook]

April News:
http://www.reactionengines.co.uk/news_apr11.html

Not sure if this improves the companies credibilty:

REL Chairman becomes High Sheriff of Hampshire

The picture, I mean.

N.

 

[Moach]

now i want one of those 33cm desktoip models! :lol: - so awesome :woohoo:

i wonder if they ship overseas... and if it woudl arrive in proper conditions

 

[Notebook]

I'm tempted, but it will have to wait for payday. Shipping should be ok, as long the BIS knows about bubble-wrap.

N.

 

[Wishbone]

High Sheriff of WHAT? All my upbringing calls me to fetch my bow and fit a singing black arrow to the string.

 

[Notebook]

Hampshire, not Nottingham. Could be worse, he could be wearing a kilt.

N.

 

[Notebook]

Some good news for RE:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-13506289

The European Space Agency's propulsion experts have assessed the details of the concept and found no showstoppers.

or maybe not, everybody likes a showstopper.

N.

 

[Notebook]

More News:

http://www.reactionengines.co.uk/press_release.html

N.

 

[Notebook]

More info about the coming Sabre engine tests here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-13520948

It will demonstrate the full engine cycle - its air-breathing and rocket modes and the transition between the two. Alan Bond, the managing director of Reaction Engines, told me:

"As you know, we are getting close to carrying out a definitive test on the heat-exchanger technology. When we've completed that we shall be moving on to what we call Phase 3 at the end of this year, and a part of that programme will be to carry out a demonstration of a fully autonomous engine.

"What it would look like is something not dissimilar to a normal jet engine, but around the outside will be a tangle of pipes you've never seen before. It will be completely new. What we're going to do is put a large heat exchanger in front of the engine and then use the exhaust of another jet engine to actually heat the air going into the demonstrator.

"We can't quite get it up to the equivalent of Mach 5; it will go up to the equivalent of about Mach 4 and a bit, but that will be enough to demonstrate the system. We might do the transition to rocket mode in a separate set of experiments to that. It's actually quite difficult at small scale to do it all in one set-up. So, we might actually split the engine in half and do the demonstration of the transition on a second rig. We're in the early days of planning all this."

Always helps to break the problem down...

Edit:

A lecture from Alan Bond of REL at Strathclyde University:
http://ewds.strath.ac.uk/space/OnDe...ling-at-the-edge-of-space--10-March-2010.aspx

Its a year old, but still interesting.

Might want to skip the first 5 minutes, its also truncated and you have to go to the University website to see the rest

The links page:
http://ewds.strath.ac.uk/space/Podcasts.aspx

Bit of a bummer this, it just links to the start of the presentation again! Should have checked before starting.
Maybe its too old, and has been dropped, if anyone finds the rest of the lecture before I do, please link it.

N.

 

[Dambuster]

June news:

http://www.reactionengines.co.uk/news_jun11.html

 

[Notebook]

August News:

Not up to much folks...

http://www.reactionengines.co.uk/news_aug11.html

Edit:
Just noticed the guide price is 2/6, two Shillings and Sixpence. Thats a lot of money in
1950 and frozen to death. I could have bought a decent Airfix model some years later.


N.

 

[Notebook]

September News:

http://www.reactionengines.co.uk/news_sep11.html

Shame about the delay in full testing, but if you are in Cape Town next week you can always ask what the problem is...

Just noticed the Pre-cooler Modules are sitting on a Blue Streak paint job bench.

N.

 

[Notebook]

Slight News:

http://www.reactionengines.co.uk/news_oct11.html

N.

 

[Dambuster]

A bit of new news (sorry, couldn't resist ) here:

http://www.reactionengines.co.uk/news_nov11.html

Nothing too exciting, although I do sort of wonder whether it's a bit premature to be moving to a new facility for the next phase of SABRE's development, when AFAIK the current phase isn't complete (unless, of course, I'm missing something - which is fairly likely).

Aside from that, there's a thread on Skylon over at NASASpaceFlight - Mark Hempsell from Reaction Engines occasionally posts in there (under the name Hempsell).
http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=24621.435

At one point in that thread (bottom of Mark Hempsell's post on page 29), he says: "The slow down is the result of a lot of little niggles none of which are show stoppers they just take time to iron out. I am not going to temp fate by making any further predictions." - anyone know anything more about this?

 

[Notebook]

Just noticed that some of the

http://www.reactionengines.co.uk/images/splm/splm_inside_crew_m.jpg

look like employees rather than volunteers...

And if we’re no more than animals, we must snatch each little scrap of happiness, and live, and suffer, and pass, mattering no more than all the other animals do or have done. It is this, or that. All the universe or nothing. Which shall it be, Passworthy?

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bRN6d-QUa5c"]Things to Come (1936) 10 of 10 - YouTube[/ame]

N.

 

[Wood]

A very nice presentation on Reaction Engines' progress (pdf):

Progress on the SKYLON Reusable Spaceplane
7th Appleton Space Conference, 8 December 2011
Alan Bond, Managing Director