AE 433 – Aerospace Propulsion

Daniel J. Bodony

Department of Aerospace Engineering

AE433 Fall 2015

Basic goals of this course

• Introduce a variety of aerospace-relevant propulsion systems– Propellers– Gas turbines (turbo{jet,fan,prop})– Higher performance systems ([sc]ramjet)

• Develop quantitative analysis tools for predicting performance

• Develop “rule-of-thumb” ideas and some intuition of orders-of-magnitude

AE433 Fall 2015

Fundamental concept of propulsion

(Efficient) conversion of potential energy

into vehicle kinetic energy

AE433 Fall 2015

Possible potential energy sourcesHuman

AE433 Fall 2015

Possible potential energy sources

Alphonse Pénaud’s Planaphore, 1871

strain energy

strain energy(whale bone)

Reproductionof Launoy &Bienvenuehelicopter, 1784

Based onChinese designfrom A.D. 4-5.

AE433 Fall 2015

Possible potential energy sources

Alphonse Pénaud’s Planaphore, 1871

strain energy

AE433 Fall 2015

Possible potential energy sources

SR-71

XCORMethane (l)

chemical (liquid)

AE433 Fall 2015

Possible potential energy sourceschemical

(solid)

AE433 Fall 2015

Other potential energy sources

• Electrical• Nuclear• Solar• Radio-isotope• …

SonexE-flight

Solar

AE433 Fall 2015

Commonalities

• Of the types of propulsion systems we just saw there were only three main methods of producing thrust– Rotating propellers– Ejection of fluid through nozzles– Ejection of high-speed particles (see AE 435)

• Our focus for this semester will be on the first two of these items, and on their integration

AE433 Fall 2015

We Will Not Cover

• Chemical rockets – AE 434– liquid– solid– hybrid

• Electric propulsion – AE 435– ion thrusters– Hall thrusters– …

• Reciprocating engines – ME 403

AE433 Fall 2015

Two Propulsion Systems

Propeller-based Nozzle-based

AE433 Fall 2015

Discussion Outline

• Propeller-based propulsion– Geometry and design– Predictive theories (actuator {disc,line}; blade

element)• Axial turbine-based propulsion– Geometry and design– Component analysis (ideal and “real”)– Component integration and matching