Disruptive Propulsion Technology Makes Endo/Exoatmosphere Operating Commercial Aircraft Possible

摘要

Applying emerging theoretical disruptive propulsion technologies to future commercial aircraft opens up bold new ways of thinking. Unproven propulsion systems with paradigm-shifting high thrust-to-power ratios enable endo/exoatmospheric flight trajectories to "fly anywhere in the world in about two hours." When a wide range of vehicle designs and flight trajectory scenarios were tested against disruptive propulsion technology performance metrics, the best-performing vehicle had a counterintuitive design. The vehicle was a mostly conventionally built commercial composite aircraft, which exhibited small, stubby folding wings, and a NASA-like elliptical cross-section fuselage for 180 passengers. The vehicle is roughly the size of a Boeing 737 MAX 9, possessing both vertical lift and horizontal thrusting propulsion. A Mach 5+ hypersonic aircraft approach was also evaluated in the trade space but considered unworkable for commericial air travel due to an unacceptable percent of vehicle mass required by the thermal protection system (TPS), a high airframe manufacturing price, and a lack of reusability and economic maintainability. However, a new endo/exoatmospheric (in atmosphere/vacuum of space) flight profile traded favorably. The aircraft maintains a near horizontal attitude throughout all flight regimes for passenger comfort, subject's passengers to only moderate g-forces, and flies mostly subsonic to local conditions while avoiding aeroheating and preventing the formation of sonic booms that will otherwise reach the ground. The vehicle takes off from conventional airports, ascends vertically to the minimum vacuum of space, and accelerates forward to high velocity to make range while maintaining constant altitude with vertical thrusting. The vehicle then reverses horizontal thrust to slow down prior to atmospheric reentry, performs a near vertical-powered descent, and lands vertically or enters a conventional aircraft landing pattern. This paper explores the possibilities introduced by new disruptive propulsion technology.