Development of productivity started in 1981

Chapter 181 Scramjet engine test successful, stealth to be tested

On August 1983, 8, at the base in northern Myanmar, the sky was as blue as a gem, cloudless and clear without a trace of clouds. The breeze blew gently, like a pair of gentle hands, quietly taking away the summer heat and bringing a hint of coolness.

The hangar door of the Aircraft Research Institute slowly opened to both sides driven by the motor, making a low roar, as if announcing the arrival of an important moment. As the door was fully opened, the first stealth aircraft appeared in front of everyone. Its smooth lines and technological shape sparkled mysteriously in the sun.

A new human, wearing a special flight suit, with a firm and confident look in his eyes, walked towards the aircraft with steady steps. He boarded the aircraft swiftly, entered the cockpit skillfully, fastened his seat belt, and put on his helmet. Then, under the tense and expectant eyes of everyone, he gently pushed the joystick, and the aircraft's engine emitted a low and powerful roar, and slowly drove out of the hangar.

As the aircraft moves forward, the wheels at the bottom of it roll steadily on the flat ground, causing a slight cloud of dust to fly. The new human being controls the aircraft attentively, constantly adjusting the speed and direction to ensure that it can safely and smoothly drive to the designated location. In the breeze, the figure of the aircraft gradually moves away, as if it is an eagle about to spread its wings and soar into the blue sky, full of strength and hope, and about to start an impressive flight journey.

This first stealth aircraft was mainly used to test the scramjet engine, so Wang Jiankun adopted a three-engine structure when manufacturing it, with two low-bypass turbofan engines on both sides of the tail and a scramjet engine in the middle.

Because at present, for manned aircraft or medium-sized aircraft flying in the atmosphere, if they want to reach a cruising speed of more than Mach 2, it is most appropriate to use a scramjet engine. Other engines, such as rocket engines, are only suitable for one-time use, and their specific impulse is too low to meet Wang Jiankun's needs.

The working principle of scramjet engine mainly consists of three steps:

The first step is air compression, where the incoming air is compressed by the forward motion of the vehicle. Unlike conventional jet engines, which rely on rotating parts such as compressors and turbines, scramjets use a more efficient and streamlined design that omits these moving parts and uses the vehicle's existing high-speed airflow to compress the incoming air. The pressurization process required to produce combustion depends on the vehicle's high speed at the beginning of the cycle.

This is why two conventional jet engines are installed on both sides, so that the aircraft can reach the initial speed that can activate the scramjet engine.

The second step is fuel mixing and combustion. The compressed air is mixed with the fuel and then ignited under supersonic conditions. In a scramjet engine, due to the high pressure and high temperature, the fuel is instantly evaporated to form a large amount of combustible gas, which in turn triggers supersonic combustion. Supersonic combustion means that the gas in the combustion chamber exceeds the speed of sound and the combustion speed is extremely fast, thereby achieving higher propulsion.

The third step is to generate thrust. The high-temperature and high-pressure gases produced by combustion are discharged through the nozzle, generating huge thrust. The engine design uses a nozzle that generates thrust, a combustion chamber designed for supersonic airflow, and a streamlined air inlet. The scramjet engine continuously generates supersonic airflow during the entire engine cycle. This design eliminates the requirement for subsonic diffusion, which is essential for the efficient combustion of traditional ramjet engines. By eliminating the need to slow down the airflow to subsonic levels (which is a fundamental limitation of traditional ramjet engines), scramjet engines can operate at maximum efficiency at extremely high speeds.

The technical difficulty of this scramjet engine lies in how to ensure that the engine maintains continuous combustion under extremely harsh conditions. There are also many difficulties in heat management and material durability.

At present, Wang Jiankun has made a breakthrough in the research of NS equations. Combined with the quantum computing ability of Zhizi, the scramjet engine he designed can work stably for 2 hours in a simulated state. Now it is necessary to take it to high altitude for actual testing.

"Attention all teams, aircraft No. 6 is about to take off. Please proceed according to the planned schedule." Wang Jiankun issued orders through the transmitter next to his ear.

"Radar tracking team received."

"Optical tracking team received."

"Thermal imaging tracking team received."

"Search and rescue team received."

As each team responded that they had received the order and were ready, Wang Jiankun issued an order: "Xin Yijia, take off according to the scheduled test flight plan."

"Got it." The test pilot of the aircraft named "Xin Yijia" manufactured by Wang Jiankun skillfully started various systems.

He sat in the cockpit, feeling the slight vibration of the aircraft, as if he had established a unique connection with a powerful partner. With the roar of the engine, the test aircraft began to accelerate and taxi on the runway like a beast ready to go.

Soon, the test aircraft took off and rushed into the blue sky. About 1 km above the base, the aircraft began to circle, and the various tracking teams on the ground also started their work in full swing, reporting the tracking test data one after another.

Xin Yijia pushed the joystick decisively according to the predetermined plan. The plane climbed rapidly, and the speed became faster and faster. The fuselage gradually disappeared from people's naked eyes. Only multiple tracking teams on the ground could capture its traces through advanced equipment.

When the plane reached an altitude of 1.8 meters, Xin Yijia quickly leveled the plane, and the test plane, driven by two turbofan engines, reached a speed of Mach 2. He calmly communicated with Wang Jiankun on the ground through communication equipment and resolutely started the scramjet engine.

In an instant, the plane seemed to be injected with infinite power and gained great acceleration. A few seconds later, Xin Yijia hurriedly shut down the turbofan engine.

He looked carefully at the speedometer and saw that the plane's speed was close to Mach 3, and the speed was still increasing rapidly. It was not until it approached Mach 5 that the acceleration gradually disappeared.

At this time, the plane had flown 5 kilometers and was about to reach the Bay of Bengal. Although Xin Yijia was a new human created by Wang Jiankun by combining the genes of several pilots, and his brain's emotional area was deliberately suppressed, a strong sense of accomplishment and mission still surged in his heart while in the ultra-high-speed aircraft.

At present, in addition to the United States and the Soviet Union, which have sent people into space through rockets and space shuttles, allowing humans to experience speeds above Mach 3, he, Xin Yijiajia, is also fortunate to become one of them. Moreover, this aircraft is different from rockets that can only experience speeds of a hundred seconds. It can fly continuously for a long time on it.

But now he was over the Bay of Bengal, and according to the test plan, he had to turn around and return quickly, because it was the first test flight and the fuel tank was not full.

While reporting on the situation of the plane, he was also maneuvering this speed monster to turn. Because the speed was too fast, he had to let the brain-computer chip take over his body to control the plane.

In order to test this super aircraft, Wang Jiankun actually did a lot of preliminary preparation. He collected a lot of flying knowledge through various open and secret channels, and then asked his uncle to find several pilots who had flown supersonic aircraft, extracted their memories, and then asked Zhizi to analyze and organize them to form a new test pilot memory package.

Then he used the bodies and genes of several pilots as templates to create Xin Yijia, who combined the best qualities of many pilots, and imported the flight memory package into his brain-computer chip.

The test aircraft flying at Mach 5 made a big turn over the Bay of Bengal, and after entering Myanmar, it flew toward northern Myanmar along the Rakhine Mountains that it had passed on the way here. When it was 200 kilometers away from the base, Xin Yijia shut down the scramjet engine and let the experimental aircraft glide toward the base. At this time, the test aircraft, which had lost power, slowly slowed down.

When it was almost approaching the base, it had reached subsonic speed. Xin Yijia turned on the turbofan engine as planned, circled over the base, aimed the nose of the plane at the runway, and then landed the plane.

"Report, the first test flight has been completed, please give instructions." Xin Yijia drove the plane into the hangar, then got off the plane with the help of external ground crew, and came to Wang Jiankun who was waiting on the side to reply.

"Very good, it was a complete success the first time. After we export the data from the simulation room, you can take a rest."

Wang Jiankun then took Xin Yijia to a simulation room in the basement, which contained a supercomputer and a large LED screen on the wall.

Xin Yijia sat in a specially made seat and put on a data transmission helmet, transferring the sensory data of what he saw, heard and even smelled during the test flight in his mind to the supercomputer.

After the data transmission was completed, Wang Jiankun started the software that had been prepared in advance, processed the data exported by Xin Yijia, and then presented it on the big screen.

The first segment is a normal scene of an airplane taking off. The images on both sides of the runway quickly recede, and then the blue sky appears in front of him. Then Wang Jiankun is very familiar with the scene of the airplane circling in the sky. He has seen it many times when he was flying the Y-1 transport plane before. Then, as a large amount of fuel is injected into the two turbofan engines, the amount and speed of gas ejected by the engines increase rapidly. The picture shakes upward with a roar, and then a fleeting wall of air appears in front of the nose of the plane, which is a sign of breaking the sound barrier.

At this time, only the slight internal vibration sound of the aircraft was heard in the simulation room, and the external sound had disappeared. That was because the sound was left behind by the aircraft and Xin Yijiajia, who was sitting in the cabin, could not hear it.

After the plane leveled off, Wang Jiankun saw the arc of the ground in the picture. That was the edge where the Indian Ocean section met the space. He had seen it before when he was in a high-altitude airship.

When the scramjet engine was turned on, the screen shook and the speedometer on it climbed rapidly, starting at 2420 kilometers per hour, and then jumping up by more than thirty. About a minute and a half later, the speed reached 6 kilometers per hour. The acceleration in the first few seconds was close to 10G. If it weren't for Xin Yijia's super physique and the super anti-gravity suit he was wearing, he would definitely faint.

At the beginning, Xin Yijia was not used to it. He held on to the fixed parts in the cabin tightly with his hands to resist the great acceleration. He was able to move freely after the acceleration decreased. He looked to both sides through the cabin glass. As his vision expanded, the mountains below quickly retreated and soon they came to the sea.

After watching Xin Yijia's first-person perspective, Wang Jiankun imported the data into another ground simulator. This simulator was on a long swing arm and could simulate acceleration and deceleration, as well as different postures of the aircraft. He prepared this for himself. After Xin Yijia completed a test, he would study on the simulator, and in the future he would be able to master supersonic flight.

The data obtained from these actual tests will be open to the Air Force in northern Myanmar in the future. When the small-batch testing of the new humans is completed and northern Myanmar begins to develop its aviation industry, these data will come in handy.

Since the scramjet engine has been tested successfully, it means that the design is reasonable. In the next two days, Xin Yijia flew the No. 6 test aircraft back and forth between the sky and the base many times, bringing back a large amount of test flight data, all of which have been saved.

Of course, the scramjet engine still malfunctioned after being used many times. Because the air is thin at high altitudes, heat dissipation is not as easy as at low altitudes. At that time, the scramjet engine was running at full power at high altitudes, and the combustion chamber melted and deformed due to heat accumulation and stalled. The structure of this combustion chamber has been precisely calculated. After the deformation, the gas cannot burn stably. Fortunately, no explosion occurred. After the scramjet engine was shut down, Xin Yijia let the aircraft glide for a distance, and when the speed dropped to Mach 2, he started the turbofan engine and drove the test aircraft back to the base.

Wang Jiankun had been collecting data on the engine's operation. Based on the wear and tear and internal atomic arrangement projected by Wang Jiankun, Zhizi roughly estimated its service life to be about 12 hours.

This lifespan is enough for Wang Jiankun. For the time being, he only plans to use this engine on his own personal travel aircraft. Following the great circle route on the earth's surface, it is only 4 kilometers to circle the earth. After the scramjet engine is activated, the aircraft can reach a speed of 6 kilometers per hour, and it can circle the earth in about 6 and a half hours.

In the future, when Wang Jiankun uses it personally, he only needs to renew the engine every time he sets out, and he can reach any point in the world.

As for follow-up research, Wang Jiankun has already made a plan. He will set up a research team composed of new humans in the base. While using their own ingenuity to develop new engines, they will also conduct wind tunnel tests on the engine that Wang Jiankun asked Zhizi to design.

After completing the core power test of the scramjet engine, Wang Jiankun began to have the base conduct stealth tests.

He used the latest plasma stealth technology on this personal small aircraft, which is more advanced than the absorbing materials currently being researched in the United States.

The principle of this technology was inspired by the Soviet Union. The people sent by my uncle collected many research projects there, among which the theory of plasma stealth appeared. However, the Soviet Union is currently only conducting theoretical research on this technology and has not yet entered the field of physical research, mainly because plasma clouds are particularly difficult to create on the surface of aircraft.

The existing equipment for producing plasma was still very bulky, and the Soviet Union was weak in precision manufacturing, so their research had no clue where to go.

There are actually many ways to produce plasma. The first is high temperature or high energy excitation: when a significant high temperature or high energy is applied to a gas, neutral substances are dissociated into ions, electrons and free radicals, thus forming plasma. For example, in the formation of lightning, the accumulation of static electricity in the cloud causes ions and electrons to flow, forming plasma, which heats the air and generates electric charges to form lightning.

This method is not suitable for Wang Jiankun to manufacture personal aircraft because the temperature is very high and can be seen by thermal imaging radar or observation equipment, although it can produce plasma to absorb and interfere with electromagnetic waves.

The second is to excite gas molecules: the most commonly used in plasma technology is non-thermal equilibrium plasma, also known as atmospheric pressure plasma, which does not need to be generated under vacuum conditions, but uses an electric field to excite gas molecules to generate plasma under normal pressure.

The third is external voltage: by applying an external voltage to the gas, the electrons in the gas gain enough energy to collide with atoms or molecules and ionize them, thereby forming plasma.

Based on the principles of the second and third plasma generation, Wang Jiankun created a graphene super ionizer.

This single ionizer is in the shape of a hexagonal patch with a side length of 1 cm. The patches can be tightly connected together and can be attached to the outside of the aircraft as the skin.

The surface of the ionizer is a special microscopic structure similar to a lotus leaf. If you look at it with a magnifying glass, you will see tiny protrusions with a diameter of about 10 nanometers and an average spacing of 1 micron.

These protrusions are discharge structures. The graphene supercapacitor at the rear end will release electrical energy to it according to the program. It will discharge the adsorbed gas to generate plasma. These plasmas will stay temporarily between these nano-protrusions and will not be instantly carried away by the air. This can ensure that the surface of the aircraft is covered by a layer of plasma cloud, thereby achieving a stealth effect.

This lotus leaf-like raised structure not only generates and stores plasma, but can also change color based on external data collected by the spacecraft, similar to the principle of a chameleon.

Under normal conditions, these ionizers are iron gray. Once necessary, they will change color according to the external environment, forming jungle camouflage or desert camouflage on the ground. After taking off, they can also change the side facing the ground to the color of the sky at that time, and the side facing the sky to the color of the ground according to the posture. At that time, as long as you are 200 meters away, you will never find the aircraft in stealth mode without careful observation.

These tiny plasmas combine a lot of bionics knowledge, which is what Wang Jiankun came up with when he collected most of the ideas for weapon manufacturing by referring to real creatures.

(End of this chapter)