Originally posted by Ray:
Still nothing, in my mind, compared to the SR71-A BlackBird... I LOVE that plane...
Maximum Speed: 3.2 Mach above 75,000 feet
Operational Ceiling: over 85,000 feet
Maximum Unrefueled Range: 3,200 nautical miles
Powerplant Data:
2 Pratt & Whitney J58 (JT11D-20A) High-bypass-turbojets with 34,000 pounds thrust
those performance numbers are estimates and are the numbers released by the government. Actual performance characteristicts are classified.
The engine is equiped with a system which allows air to bypass the engine's compressor assembly and directly enter the combustor section. This in part allows the engine to perform as a ram jet at high speeds allowing it to produce more net thrust as its speed increases, in other words, the faster it goes the faster it goes. It is rumored that the engines have the capability to propell the aircraft to speeds exceeding the airframe's structual limits, but there has been no documented proof released to proove this.
The term high bypass means that the engine is a turbo fan engine and not a turbo jet. The bypass ratio is the ratio of thrust produced by the fan to the thrust produced by the core engine. For an engine to be calssified as a high bypass engine the bypass ratio of thrust mae by the fan to thrust from the core engine must be greater than or equal to 4:1.
I work with a few people who had the opportunity to work on the aircraft as civilian contractors, and they, along with others say, for an aircraft built in the 50's it was way ahead of its time and that we could not build an equal today only becasue of the incredible costs.
