Reaction engines

[cowpatz]

Very interesting with London to Sydney flight times of 4 hrs achievable.
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[Ian Warren]

Interesting the share weight of the cooling unit .. but like time is life this thing will add days to a holiday .... and with the 'Gs' .. the wrinkles .. least me take em off my face making me younger

[Timmo]

Interesting.

It's only one piece in the puzzle though- Supersonic/hypersonic craft also need some pretty advance materials to deal with heat build up as well as a lot of fuel to achieve the heights/speeds they desire. As Concord taught us, just because high speed is possible, it doesn't always make it viable- People would like to travel from the UK to Aussie in 4 hours....but if the cost is 3 times as much, they may just settle for the longer/cheaper option.

[Ian Warren]

QUOTE (Timmo @ Nov 6 2012,11:06 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

....but if the cost is 3 times as much, they may just settle for the longer/cheaper option.

when you say that Tim , Its a true part off my holiday is the flight time and the looking , 11/12 hour flights always look forward to them ... just make sure i have a window seat .. i could easy do the return in its turn around .

[cowpatz]

QUOTE (Timmo @ Nov 6 2012,10:06 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Interesting.

It's only one piece in the puzzle though- Supersonic/hypersonic craft also need some pretty advance materials to deal with heat build up as well as a lot of fuel to achieve the heights/speeds they desire. As Concord taught us, just because high speed is possible, it doesn't always make it viable- People would like to travel from the UK to Aussie in 4 hours....but if the cost is 3 times as much, they may just settle for the longer/cheaper option.

Quite right. Constructing an airframe that can withstand sustained high mach speeds and the associated heat cycles will be a challenge but technology has moved on from the Concorde and the SR71 that were dreamt up in the 60's and 70's.
Time will tell.

[IslandBoy77]

It's great to see people researching and building the initial next-gen stuff like this. My only disappointment is that we so often hear about cool stuff like this, never to hear about it again (or, seemingly so). I still remember reading about the "soldier of the future" in a magazine article (a REAL paper mag, not a digital one - remember those? ), and here we are almost 30 years later and the bulk of the tech being looked at then STILL hasn't made it into the real world. Ditto with the computer storage based on bio-engineered pig's brain cells read by lasers - cheap, relatively easy to manufacture with massive storage capacity - yet again, nothing. Too many vested interests wanting to hobble technology, eh?

[Ian Warren]

Big one is .. and it happened with Concorde .. and the debacle with that .. Noise , safety , fuel ... then what ever the complainers ... the HCs off the world