Ships & Modules

In the air, faster than in a vacuum?

NASA has been officially recognized for setting the speed record for a jet-powered aircraft by Guinness World Records.

NASA set the record in November during the third and final flight of the experimental X-43A scramjet (supersonic-combustion ramjet) project. The X-43A demonstrated an advanced form of air-breathing jet engine could power an aircraft nearly 10 times the speed of sound. Data from the unpiloted, 12-foot-long research vehicle show its revolutionary engine worked successfully at Mach 9.6 (approximately 7,000 mph), as it flew over the Pacific Ocean west of California.

The flight was the culmination of NASA's Hyper-X Program. Hyper-X, a seven-year, approximately $230 million ground and flight test program, explored alternatives to rocket power for space access vehicles.

This is the second world speed record earned by the Hyper-X Program. The first followed a Mach 6.8 (approximately 5,000 mph) flight in March 2004. Both records will be featured in the 2006 edition of the Guinness World Records book published in September 2005. The fastest air-breathing, manned vehicle, the SR-71, achieved slightly more than Mach 3.2. The X-43A more than tripled the top speed of the jet-powered SR-71.

NASA is interested in supersonic combustion scramjet technology, because the engines get their oxygen from the atmosphere. That allows for more airplane-like operations for increased affordability, flexibility and safety in ultra-high-speed flights and for the first stage to Earth orbit. Once a scramjet-powered vehicle is accelerated to approximately Mach 4 by a conventional jet engine or booster rocket, it can fly at hypersonic speeds, possibly as fast as Mach 15, without carrying heavy oxidizer, as rockets must.

A ramjet operates by subsonic combustion of fuel in a stream of air compressed by the forward speed of the aircraft. In a regular jet engine, fan blades compress the air. In a scramjet, the airflow through the whole engine remains supersonic.

The Guinness World Record certificate:

"On 16 November, 2004, NASA's unmanned Hyper-X (X-43A) aircraft reached Mach 9.6. The X-43A was boosted to an altitude of 33,223 meters (109,000 feet) by a Pegasus rocket launched from beneath a B52-B jet aircraft. The revolutionary 'scramjet' aircraft then burned its engine for around 10 seconds during its flight over the Pacific Ocean."

Related flight records:

The previous record for an air-breathing vehicle, but not an airplane, was held by a ramjet-powered missile, which achieved slightly more than Mach 5. The highest speed attained by a rocket-powered airplane, NASA's X-15, was Mach 6.7.

The Hyper-X program was conducted by NASA's Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate with the agency's Langley Research Center, Hampton, Va. Langley was lead NASA center with responsibility for hypersonic technology development. The NASA Dryden Flight Research Center, Edwards, Calif., is responsible for flight research and testing.


source: http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2005/jun/HQ_05_156_X43A_Guinness.html

9.6 Ma = 3264 ms-1

You seem to be confused about per second speed v.s. per hour speed.

Sublight speeds in EVE are unrealistically low while accelerations are unrealistically high. Old news. Canonically, it's explained via some warp drive mumbo-jumbo that no one cares about because this is not a flight simulator.

I think this should explain fluffy part, just in case you care (refer to links on that page if that's not enough):
Wiki on interstellar travel and such

Also indeed, old news is very old. Just reminds me how everyone hates using search function or Googling, including myself.

shuttles can also travel 6 au/s. Let's see you do that in atmosphere.

~3129 m/s

That's the speed it was traveling at to tl;dr all that.

Unlike mentioned in a previous post, this ship isn't traveling with propulsion mods. There is no MWD or 'After Burner' present here. The ship is designed to do that speed and isn't even remotely moddable. It is what it is and changes would be incorporated in design after testing, and result in developing a new craft.

Putting a V8 in a Miata is modding.

This particular craft, as designed probably doesn't even have the capability of doing anything but what it was doing. It is simple a testing platform for a technology that relies heavily on the design of the craft itself. Forcing air at supersonic speeds into an engine would require some serious aerodynamics.

Not saying it can't be used elsewhere, but its effectiveness will change and it may lose or gain efficiency and speed depending on the application.

Think of an Intercooler and Turbocharger on a car engine. This is a mod yes, but it is similar in principle, with the primary exception that the whole of the craft is incorporated into the design, rather than just something under the hood. This is why I say it doesn't have any relation to propulsion mods. There is no way you could fit this to another craft and successfully do the same thing.

What would happen, is you'd end up not having the available oxygen under pressure, traveling at supersonic speeds to provide the burn for the engines. You also wouldn't have the fans, (actually more like a turbocharger which relies on them), to force the air in, so you'd be flying on rocket power for as long as the fuel was available.

The other reason you wouldn't see much benefit, is because your craft wouldn't be slipping through the air like this one does, due to not having turbulence reduction with a high flow of air through the craft, rather than around it. It must be one heck of a design to be honest, when you think of all that must be incorporated into it.

Slipping is like downforce on an F1 racer in this case, but where the limited space under the car provides the aerodynamics and speed due to low pressure below changing the way the air resistance effects the vehicle, the Scramjet has higher pressure below, (as all aircraft), and lower above, and both of these will be reduced by the air flowing through at higher pressures.

You're essentially taking the air providing resistance ahead of you and slipping it through your vehicle instead of slipping your vehicle through it. Both actually, but more of one than the other as you increase in velocity.

Quite interesting.

This is also a GAME. It wouldn't be very fun to try PVP-ing with true Newtonian physics making it incredibly hard to turn anywhere and get a vector on your target. Well, maybe it would but it's not going to happen now because that would require a complete revamp of code and gameplay in an unnecessary direction.

And if our ships really did reach closing speeds of 50,000 mph or more you would have quite a tough time staying in range for your guns to do anything, let alone track.

Gameplay > Realism

Hilarious that ppl are still trying to compare rl physics to eve physics, roflmao?

Dude! It’s a DRONE. Why are you comparing it to a shuttle?

real spaceship combat is boring and exceptionally fast.
Scramjets aren't common tech but are still current tech, pointing out that current tech (rl) is better in some ways then far far future tech (game) isn't that ridicules but it is pointless.

Remember that physics aren't universal in EvE so what ever rules you thought you were playing with dont actually apply.

edit :
PS, Liquid vacuum.