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A scramjet (supersonic combustion ramjet) is a variant of a ramjet airbreathing jet engine in which combustion takes place in supersonic airflow. As in ramjets,[1] a scramjet relies on high vehicle speed to compress the incoming air forcefully before combustion (hence ramjet), but whereas a ramjet decelerates the air to subsonic velocities before combustion using shock cones, a scramjet has no shock cone and slows the airflow using shockwaves produced by its ignition source in place of a shock cone.[2] This allows the scramjet to operate efficiently at extremely high speeds.[3]
Although scramjet engines have been used in a handful of operational military vehicles, scramjets have so far mostly been demonstrated in research test articles and experimental vehicles.
- ^ "Lorin Ramjet". www.enginehistory.org.
- ^ Analysis of Ignition Process in a Scramjet at Low and High Fueling Rates, Gareth Dunlap, Elias Fekadu, Ben Grove, Nick Gabsa, Kenneth Yu, Camilo Munoz, Jason Burr.
- ^ Urzay, Javier (2018). "Supersonic combustion in air-breathing propulsion systems for hypersonic flight". Annual Review of Fluid Mechanics. 50 (1): 593–627. Bibcode:2018AnRFM..50..593U. doi:10.1146/annurev-fluid-122316-045217.