Chapter 295: Change Cycle
The information kept surging and refining in Wu Tong's mind. Wu Tong took out a piece of draft paper and wrote down on it one by one the technical essence she had refined, the reference direction, and the shortcomings they wanted to overcome.
As for the fan defect, based on the reserves of super blade materials currently developed for WS-15S, it should be able to basically cover this defect and prevent it from becoming a stumbling block to technological breakthroughs.
The wake vortex is too high, and this problem still needs to be solved from the engine itself. If the problem of too high wake vortex cannot be solved, their ultra-high temperature resistant coating, reinforced coating, and new super roadbed material combination can all become technical reserve options to overcome this shortcoming, or can be used in combination.
The engine is too big and too heavy, these are the two most important problems that need to be solved urgently. The engine should be moderate and not take up too much space, and important space should be freed up for the increase in ammunition load.
Similarly, the engine weight cannot be too heavy, which is almost proportional to the excessive volume. When the volume is reduced, the weight will naturally not increase, but will automatically decrease!
In fact, at the current level of technology, the basic performance of WS-15S is already superior enough. However, the foundation of WS-15 is only developed based on conventional take-off and landing fighters, and it cannot be directly used.
If we want to apply it to the STOVL fighter, we still need to go a step further on this basis and let it break through the current situation where the combat radius of the ST0VL fighter is less than 300 kilometers.
The Chinese Sea is vast, and the combat radius is too narrow, which is really useless. It is not that it is not worth investing a lot of money in it, although it is necessary, but the money should always be spent on the right things and not wasted.
In particular, when compared with the current J-20's 20,000-kilometer range and the H-20's 30,000-kilometer basic range, the combat radius is ten to twenty times the 300-kilometer data, which makes it even more pitiful.
The battlefield is changing rapidly. The army has to rely on refueling tankers to keep working and has a narrow combat radius... These are all fatal in a battle. If no changes are made, there will be no practical significance.
A breakthrough is imperative. How can we make the same tank of fuel, which can only fly 300 kilometers after the original engine's super-maneuvering operation, to be reduced accordingly if it is fully loaded with ammunition, and optimized to increase it tenfold to a combat radius of 3,000 kilometers or even more?
Various ideas flashed through Wu Tong's mind one by one. As if it was a premonition, Wu Tong unconsciously drew a circle, and this circle attracted Wu Tong's attention at the same time. The light of inspiration lit up in Wu Tong's mind!
Circle means cycle. The cycle repeats itself, which is the movement of heaven.
Over and over again, cycle after cycle, cycle, change... change into a cycle!
Yes, it is a cycle.
Wu Tong's eyes sparkled, and the storm in his mind stirred up waves, rolling up more continuous thoughts, and began to build blocks to gather more clues for breakthroughs.
The thermodynamic cycle characteristics of traditional aviation turbine engines are fixed. When designing traditional turbofan engines, a trade-off must be made between high thrust and high efficiency. It is not possible to have both, nor can it be switched at any time.
An engine can only work in one mode and has the best performance only within a limited flight range. This traditional mode cannot meet the consumption of short-distance vertical takeoff and super maneuverability. So, can she change this tradition?
Variable cycle engine, or VCE, is a conceptual theory proposed in the 1950s and 1960s.
At that time, with the advent of the turbofan engine, its superior subsonic performance and high propulsion efficiency made engine designers constantly pursue engines with larger bypass ratios.
In supersonic flight, the fuel consumption rate of a high bypass ratio turbofan engine is significantly higher than that of a low bypass ratio turbofan engine of the same thrust level, which limits the further increase of the bypass ratio of supersonic aircraft engines. In order to make the aircraft engine have better performance in both subsonic and supersonic states, the concept of VCE variable cycle engine was born.
As fighter aircraft technology continues to improve and their flight envelopes continue to expand, after the 1980s, the world began to pay more attention to the integrated design of aircraft airframe/propulsion systems. Since variable cycle engines have particularly obvious advantages in meeting the above indicators, research on variable cycle engines for military fighter aircraft has gradually begun.
Domestic research in this area cannot be said to be completely blank, but it is not much better than in this area. It can only be said to be in its embryonic stage. Wu Tong has seen some fragmentary information in this area in confidential materials, and there is not much room for reference.
Wu Tong did not think of this plan at first, until she suddenly drew a circle and thought of the cycle, and then pulled out the concept of changing the cycle from the depths of her memory.
However, this was not something that Wu Tong needed to worry about. For her, having a clear direction was the most important thing, and the rest was just filling in the foundation step by step, especially since she had the assistance of absolute deduction.
"Brother Lu, I have a direction for engine optimization. Please notify Brother Cai and arrange for me to extend the time of returning to school!" Wu Tong didn't even raise her head. She seemed to reflexively ask Lu Xiao to help her convey the instructions. She also gave Lu Xiao the good news of definite progress.
Almost as soon as he finished speaking, Wu Tong entered a state of concentrated research, his hands constantly pushing and extending the work.
Wu Tong continued to refine the elements of the variable cycle engine, recording the key points on the draft paper. It is a multi-design point engine that adjusts its thermodynamic cycle parameters by changing the geometry, size or position of some components.
Such as compression ratio, turbine inlet temperature, air flow and bypass ratio, changing the engine cycle working mode, high thrust or low fuel consumption so that the engine can work in the best condition under various flight conditions.
At the same time, the variable cycle engine can operate in multiple modes, including turbine mode, turbofan mode and ramjet mode, so it has good performance in subsonic, transonic, supersonic and hypersonic flight conditions.
Wu Tong held the pen and began to calculate based on the quasi-perfect aerodynamic layout parameters he had just derived.
Based on the thrust required by the engine, the dynamic parameters of super maneuverable takeoff, and the concept of variable cycle engine elements, Wu Tong began to build two sets of three-dimensional perspective model diagrams in the deduction space. One set is the existing WS-15S, and the other is a simple parameter model diagram that is still only a rough outline and very vague.
"Okay!" Lu Xiao's voice was light and steady. Although he did not catch the moment when Wu Tong's inspiration was born, he was familiar with Wu Tong's state of full devotion to research. This was not the first time he had seen Wu Tong's state. Every time, it represented the birth of a miracle! Joy surged in his heart, and he was looking forward to Wu Tong's breakthrough progress!
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