test content
What is the Arc Client?
Install Arc

My engine design

SystemSystem Member, NoReporting Posts: 178,019 Arc User
edited May 2012 in Ten Forward
engine0001.png



So, what's inside the bulb? There is a circular airfoil inside. We all know what lift and drag are correct. I mean we wouldn't be 'good' nerds if we didn't.

So I was pondering a way to design a concept of an interplanetary propulsion system that does not need any type of combustible fuel that can have multiple backup power systems.

I work at Boeing and one day as I strolled through the factory here in Everett, WA I was starring at the airfoil of a 787 Dreamliner. I thought to myself that even though most of the plane is composite it must still take an enormous amount of energy to 'lift' it off of the ground.

So, in my thinking, I figured what would happen if we exceeded the lift required to move an object? My hypothesis, a high power to weight ratio just like a rocket motor. So I used some crude wing design software, downloadable for free from NASA JPL, to design an airfoil.

First I calculated the 'Zero-Wing' as I have coined it, to be 50ft in DIA with a wing width of 15ft and a 20 DEG camber and a severe thickness (don't want to give away to much. I came up with a wing that would generate over 700K lbs of lift.

The image you see now is of a much smaller 25ft DIA drive motor. I wanted to make them 'stackable' meaning you can align more than one behind one and other.

So, you guys still with me? Now for the redundant power sources. You have your primary Thorium (Th90) reactor, then carbon nanotube battery packs to run off of which are pre charged by the reactor and a deployable solar array to charge batteries and drive the motor.

Now as we all know the air velocity over the top of an airfoil is greater however less dense (lower pressure) than the underside. So my wing in the bulb is symmetrically circular. Problem eh....I think not. The higher velocity air get crammed down the doughnut hole of the wing at high velocity and then becomes highly pressurized. This creates a suction that is almost ever flowing. The turbine still needs to pack air in however the driver motor only has to work 1/2 as hard and so does the reactor. Now all of this air is contained internally so it's always there. This engine is designed to work in space or under water and does not to need to interact with the outside world.

Because all that hi pressure blow off is also driving the turbine, hence the carbon nano tube reinforced polymer blades which are use for acrobatic flights and air racing. They can withstand high levels of stress.

The feeder ducts are exposed to space at some point on them to cool the air and make it more dense. The laser array inside heats the airflow over the top of the wing expanding it making it more less dense. This gives the laws of physics a false sense of security. It tricks it into thinking the wing inside is generating more lift that it is.

There is no aerodynamic drag acting on the wing since the air is being pulled away by the turbine. Think of driving behind a tractor/trailer to reduce drag on your car to save gas. All you have is pure force acting in a forward motion. Jet engines work the same way. It's not all that fire you see shooting out of the back, although nice to look at, it's the forward pressure on the compressor. So, in way I'm using plain old aerodynamics and part of the 'Brayton Cycle'.

The reactor fins are exposed to space and are filled with water that is chemically treated not to freeze just get cool. In the event of a catastrophic failure the whole reactor can be blown into space via small SRB booster rockets attached to it.

I'm glad I mailed this to myself today. Cause if it works I'll be rich. Still filing my patent even though mailing it will suffice in a court of law, lol.


:D
Post edited by Unknown User on
«1

Comments

  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    I like that you say "nothing more than"... xD
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    anazonda wrote: »
    I like that you say "nothing more than"... xD

    Well...you know hat I mean ;). The most complicated thing on here is the 'real life' experimental Thorium reactor. We've ben making magnetic drive motors since before I was boring in the mid-70's.


    I will be posting a detailed explanation soon. Rightnow I'm just baiting the trolls to get it over with.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    I like it.

    It's technical. There's a flow to it (no idea how it works, but it reminds me of a 60s nuclear aircraft engine prototype, using reactor heat to drive a turbine). It looks exactly like the Atrox carrier's drive system if you can imagine scaling this up a thousand times and putting it through a Star Trek designer's board.

    Best of all I like it because about 6-7 years back I had a discussion with a US Army attack helo pilot about Cold War era nuclear propelled aircraft.

    We were doing collaborative sci fi game design and I proposed using a centreline mounted plasma reactor as a sort of dual purpose space and atmospheric propulsion system. In space it powers ship systems, weapons and thrusters, in atmosphere the heat generated by the reactor would itself allow the hollow centre of the vessel as a sort of ramjet for limited duration supersonic flight.

    I was pleasantly surprised when he wrote back saying there was a 'nuclear turbojet' back in the day that functioned on the same principle. Reactor as a heating element.

    And there's your troll protection. There's nothing flawed about this concept. Infact, in another alternative universe, Earth could very well have created nuclear propelled air and spacecraft, and we'd see such engines in widespread use by now in that mirror universe.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    carmenara wrote:
    I was pleasantly surprised when he wrote back saying there was a 'nuclear turbojet' back in the day that functioned on the same principle. Reactor as a heating element..

    Yeppers I think I have seen that. The exhaust would look like a phaser beam comming out the back.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    spektre12 wrote:
    Yeppers I think I have seen that. The exhaust would look like a phaser beam comming out the back.

    You mean the airstream got so hot it became a stream of superheated plasma? That is -a lot- of thrust.

    Just got a couple of questions about your mechanical design. Not going to touch on the basic principle, that's you department, but the airflow I'm curious about.

    I see a reactor and mag drive stack remotely connected to a turbine stage. Turbine looks like a remote unit separate from the reactor which is good. Modular, and jettisonable in case emergency separation of the moving parts were ever deemed necessary.

    Can you confirm air goes into the front (of the turbofan like impeller), goes into the heating element and out the back of the engine? First diagram at the top doesn't have a visible exhaust, hence the question.

    If so this could be mounted on a aircraft or ship in such a way there is a smooth nacelle over the wing or hull surface for the reactor itself, and the only thing visible externally is the shroud where the fan and heating element is. Potentially you could have an aircraft shaped around the engine itself and the whole thing would look as sleek as a Skylon type spaceplane.

    The curved intake duct means a more compact assembly which is perfect for a starship lifting engine. Design is currently not adapted for supersonic flight. Post Mach 1 you'd probably want a SR-71 type 'ramjet' appendage at the back, or some sort of scramjet for continuous supersonic airflow. Possibly your engine could have a common reactor and multiple turbine modules for different purposes. Cheap and modular.

    However I'm unsure if this will work as a space drive - I guess once out of the atmosphere the exhaust and fan appendage could serve as a waste heat discharger (heatsink) and the turbine disconnected, whist reactor does whatever its supposed to do powering the ship electrically or with EPS or whatnot.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    Explanation added in POST #1
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    carmenara wrote:
    Can you confirm air goes into the front (of the turbofan like impeller), goes into the heating element and out the back of the engine? First diagram at the top doesn't have a visible exhaust, hence the question. .

    Yes it does. I only made it visible in my sketch to give you all an idea. I will sketch out a cut-away or I will just model and engine in 3DS Max. ;)
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    spektre12 wrote:
    Explanation added in POST #1

    Very nice. Totally different from my redneck nuclear turbojet but also perfectly understandable. A self contained semi enclosed airfoil with thrust (indirectly) produced from laser heating, to produce a sort of self-lifting engine.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    I do however believe that you need to 'launch' something out of the craft, as if you throw, say, superheated air, into a wall, trying to conserve fuel, you will have negated the thrust of the engine by having the engine exhaust hit the ship again.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    dalolorn wrote:
    I do however believe that you need to 'launch' something out of the craft, as if you throw, say, superheated air, into a wall, trying to conserve fuel, you will have negated the thrust of the engine by having the engine exhaust hit the ship again.

    Have thought of that too. Maybe start off with a simpler design. Reactor generates electricity which powers lasers which superheats air in a pulsejet like appendage = thorium/electric hybrid jet engine proof of concept.

    Mark II of the above uses OP's internal 'Zero' airfoils to make it even more efficient.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    The whole problem is in the fact that eventually you consume the air, thus consuming either your only source of oxygen, your fuel supply, or both. I think you should figure out a way to release some sort of particles at high speeds, rather than adapt existing engines
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    Upon seeing the turbine stage I presumed it was an atmospheric only engine anyway.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    dalolorn wrote:
    I do however believe that you need to 'launch' something out of the craft, as if you throw, say, superheated air, into a wall, trying to conserve fuel, you will have negated the thrust of the engine by having the engine exhaust hit the ship again.

    I agree with this. It's great to think about ways to propel things in space, but Newton's 3rd law is gonna get you. You have to throw something out the back to move forward. The ion engines are pretty awesome at this already. They accelerate a particle to high speed and shoot it out the back to get a lot more momentum from the mass.

    Also... the thorium reactor in a compact, nonservicable engine is probably a bad move. They are much more complicated than the simple uranium guys, even if they work in practice. Fewer things that can go wrong usually means fewer things will go wrong.

    Just my thoughts on your thoughts about thoughts on mankind's longterm thoughts. :confused:
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    ...I'm trying to think of where to start with my critique... with Newton's Laws, fluid dynamics, terminology...

    I think I'm going to start by saying I have absolutely no idea from an engineering standpoint how this is supposed to provide thrust or lift, other than through the Troll Science principle. Any thrust you gain is going to be cancelled out by redirecting the flow to go back into the engine, and a pressure vessel with a radially-symmetric O-shaped airfoil in the center will not generate any lift...

    The turbine is not a turbine, it's a compressor fan. Turbines extract work from flows, compressors exert work on them. Also, I'd be concerned about the fatigue and strain properties of a polymer in an axial compressor type system...

    The airfoil... doesn't look like it'll work, either. You'll end up with major issues with your flow, including highly non-laminar flow, vastly increasing the drag and thus stress on the supports...
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    [QUOTE=MandoKnight;4213315Troll Science principle[/QUOTE]

    Not quite bud, but nice try starting a flamming fest. I think you need to show me your idea.........if you have an original one to share.Your caveman approach to 'Let's kill the thing we can't understand' is unbecoming. If I were trolling you'd know. This is a genuine idea of mine that I put some thought into.:rolleyes:

    For the smart people in here......

    Oh hey guys for the heated air part I know I said superheated but what I really meant was heated like a hot summer day in Iraq. Whe it is cooler outside a plan requires less speed to generate lift. I know someone on here asked about that.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    No, I just honestly can't see how that thing produces thrust. It simply doesn't make sense other than in a "I'll put a magnet in front of my car and another one on a boom in front of the first and they'll pull my car along" manner.

    What it looks like to me is an oddly-shaped wind tunnel.

    What I would like to see is what you're sending to the Patent Office, the experimental data from any prototypes, a detailed analysis of the theoretical model, etc.

    I remain highly skeptical because you propose a system that supposedly breaks the conservation of energy and momentum. You can't get momentum change of a system from forces only within that system.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    It simply doesn't make sense other than in a "I'll put a magnet in front of my car and another one on a boom in front of the first and they'll pull my car along" manner.

    Maybe I will draw a cut away and further explain. I alos do not believe in the whole magnet in front of the car thing either. This is just a theoretical design and concept.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    I like that you're so gung ho about an idea! I too love to sit around and try to figure things out or make up some new way of doing things. It's good for your brain and it's alot of fun.

    I hope you don't get discouraged by the flaming going on.. I understand the guy's questions, but i thought it really came off as condecending, arrogant and rude.

    That being said, can you answer the question of where the thrust is coming from? It seems to me that the engine is circulating air around inside of a close space. Specifically, as you said, it isn't interacting with the space around it.. that means no thrust right?

    I dunno, ask Newton I guess.

    Awesome start, though. Please keep working on it. i figure we gotta get this interstaller travel thing going pretty soon if i'm ever gonna get to go. (starting to get up there in years, but don't tell anyone.)
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    I don't think that there's any flaming going on. What I see is a proper competitive discussion about the merits of the OP's design. There will always be criticism against new and innovative ideas and these ideas ultimate survive to see reality if they can satisfy said concerns and criticism. Negative criticism is IMO not trolling but a unique exclusive offer to try and prove the workings of the new concept.

    IMO everyone's concerns and observations are valid and relevant to the scope of the discussion.

    If we were in Victorian England and we draw up a proposal for a compact gas turbine we'd probably be labelled far worse than trolls ourselves. Yet, less than a century later (in the 30s) there already were working models and plans for jet aircraft, that due to wartime research rapidly moved to revolutionalize air travel as we know it today.

    I see that today, advanced jet propulsion systems and computer technology too is progressing by leaps and bounds. Just a decade ago we'd never thought to see jetliners with ultra-quiet turbofans and flexible wings cruising at near-stratospheric altitudes but now we do. Can you imagine a plane with flexible wings? Composite technology + supercritical wing research at Boeing made all that possible.

    Granted, both the 787 and the Joint Strike Fighter faced large cost penalties partly from being so radical in design but at the end they have become superb marvels of next-generation technology. 25 years ago, who would have thought the US would produce a low observable lift-fan powered hovering aircraft? It's something exclusive and wonderful to watch in action. (Although last I heard the V/STOL F-35C may not be deployed at all? Got any sources?)

    What's stopping space travel technology from going bonkers next?
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    Sketch5430 wrote: »
    That being said, can you answer the question of where the thrust is coming from?

    Sure thing Captain!

    The thrust or force is coming from the 'zero wing' inside. Basically the air is constantly circulated over a circular shaped wing with an airfoil crossection. Thus this simulates the effect of flying because the magdrive turbine blade is doing both intake/exhaust work.

    Now as we all know wings generate lift and they have to generate a lot of it to get something like.....say a big Boeing 747-8 off the ground (non-freighter). I thought why not use that 'force' in a different way? Since there is nothing in space (as we know it) the forward pressure of the wing will drive the craft forward. Rockets do this very thing by exhaust gas velocity. I'm just using what is already there.

    I cannot speculate how fast a craft would go but theoretically my design produces 700K-lbs of lift/force. That's having two airfoils in the 'bulb'. As you can see from the simulation software it's showing around 420K-lbs, now multiply by 2 and you get 840K. I say it would bee 700K just to be on the safe side. Now imagine having a Gladius Class ship with two of my engines on it. One on each pylon. And lets say it weigh in at 15K Tons. We would have a 23:1 thrust per pound weight ratio!

    An F/A-18 Superhornet weighs in at 65,000 lbs (max take off weight) and has 44,000 lbs-thrust (dual engines) and it goes 1300 + mph in earths atmosphere.

    Now just off the top of my head, our ship flying around in space with no atmosphere to push on it or no way for our engine to stall and very little inertia (lack of liquid fuel slaoshing around) and almost no gravity....I'd venture to say that we'd be to able to hit upward of 200,000mph.


    Oh here's the gimmie image:

    capturencn.jpg


    :D
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    That's interesting - an aero-thermodynamic engine that generates propulsive force internally using controlled airfoil effects.

    That's what I could think of given my level of redneck "duct tape and cable ties" engineering.

    If the theory works we could have some sort of closed-cycle self contained 'anti gravity' UFO drive that just sorts of hums around the sky with no visible exhaust.

    I still can't figure out where the air comes from in deep space (unless its a closed cycle system with internal air supply in the ship.. sort of a propulsive HVAC) but your current explanation does give a lot more insight to the device's functionality :)

    On for further discussions - positive start this evening!
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    carmenara wrote:
    I still can't figure out where the air comes from in deep space (unless its a closed cycle system with internal air supply in the ship.

    Yes! the air is self contained. The air flowing on the top side of the airfoil is only heated to about 120 F. The underside is at 32 F. There would be no icing because the I would be using (if this were tio become reality) dry oil free air. Because If I heated the air to say the temprature of a Bic lighter we'd comsume it all. This way it really never goes away, at least in theory. Or we could just use same 'temp' air all around?

    ;)
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    spektre12 wrote:
    Yes! the air is self contained. The air flowing on the top side of the airfoil is only heated to about 120 F. The underside is at 32 F. There would be no icing because the I would be using (if this were tio become reality) dry oil free air. Because If I heated the air to say the temprature of a Bic lighter we'd comsume it all. This way it really never goes away, at least in theory. Or we could just use same 'temp' air all around?

    ;)

    I think we are presently limited by the concept that to produce thrust, you need some sort of jet coming out the tailpipe to produce 'reaction thrust'. This is why there is natural initial opposition to your self contained "UFO" propulsion.

    However though continuous discussion on the basic principles of this "internal airfoil propulsion" it will be easier for more to study the concept and viability of it.

    And another thing - we are on a science fiction forum. We should be open to more of these things.

    I am not really concerned if we will see self-lifting devices on air and spacecraft - that will probably be long after I'm gone from this world.

    But this is good inspiration. We're taking a simple aerodynamic principle and making it do things never before imagined. It doesn't matter if it's just a theory and a drawing. What matters is we have the drive to think, create, and to imagine.

    We need more of these concept art and concept technology. That is why I read a lot of Victorian era science fiction. Many of them have a fantasy tune to them, and the technology is very wierd to us modern humans. But that doesn't matter.

    Almost 2 centuries ago, Jules Verne dared to dream and dared to think big. That's why we have space shuttles and we have unlimited range submarines today. The mechanics are different. But the concept WORKS!

    It is ideas such as presented in this very thread, that paves the way for Mankind's own exploration of the stars. Not on paper, but in physical reality.

    Don't shoot down our ability to dream :)

    So I would say. Damn the torpedoes and patent it. Who knows, we just might see a Boeing Self Lifting Engine in the far future :)
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    carmenara wrote:
    ISo I would say. Damn the torpedoes and patent it. Who knows, we just might see a Boeing Self Lifting Engine in the far future :)



    :DThank you for understanding! Yooooo rock Carmen!
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    The concepts were after all created in good faith and in the good spirit of progress. The effort must be honoured.

    I believe too that Starfleet would present itself as open, communicative and supportive to all new ventures in the name of science.

    That's probably why we can adapt Borg technology to use on Admiral level ships for STF missions. Science ftw :D
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    You can't use ideal flow for your data at those conditions. Most airfoils stall at around a 15 degree angle of attack. You'll have significant flow separation, which leads to a loss of lift and greatly increased drag.

    Also, the lift on the wing isn't generated magically: Newton's 3rd Law states that an equal and opposite reaction must be occurring on the airflow lifting the wing section. Since the flow never leaves the system, Newton's 1st Law states that the net effect on the system (the engine as a whole) will be 0.

    If you exhaust the gas, then you have a ducted fan with static airfoil sections in the jet stream, which will provide some extra lift at the cost of reduced overall thrust.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    If you exhaust the gas, then you have a ducted fan with static airfoil sections in the jet stream, which will provide some extra lift at the cost of reduced overall thrust.

    As I recall there were some very interesting ducted-fan propeller aircraft concepts Pre-WW2. They were quite insane looking.

    I'm going to see if I can dig up some info on them. They were STOL capable due to the extra lift.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    spektre12 wrote:
    Yes! the air is self contained. The air flowing on the top side of the airfoil is only heated to about 120 F. The underside is at 32 F. There would be no icing because the I would be using (if this were tio become reality) dry oil free air. Because If I heated the air to say the temprature of a Bic lighter we'd comsume it all. This way it really never goes away, at least in theory. Or we could just use same 'temp' air all around?

    ;)

    If the air on the top side is heated, and it's all self-contained, then what keeps the heat from passing to the cooler air on the underside? In other words, how are you keeping the cool air cool?
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    carmenara wrote:
    As I recall there were some very interesting ducted-fan propeller aircraft concepts Pre-WW2. They were quite insane looking.

    I'm going to see if I can dig up some info on them. They were STOL capable due to the extra lift.

    There's also the Martin Jetpack, which is what I think of when I hear or use the phrase "ducted fan." Similarly, the F-35B STOVL variant (recently featured in the Avengers!) has a "lift fan" powered by the main engine for vertical landing.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2012
    It is a nice effort, but ultimately a failed concept.

    This is not the same thing as a ducted fan, a ducted fan is enclosed only around the outside edge, it still has an intake and an exhaust. This concept is completely enclosed.

    As others have tried to explain you will not gain thrust from an internally isolated device that in no way interacts with the outside universe.

    As other have noted in thrust gained by moving air is lost by redirecting air. If you are depending upon the pressure differentials then the high pressure on the bottom side of the air foil is canceled out by the high pressure against the lower side of the containment, and the low pressure on the foil is like wise canceled out by low pressure against the upper wall of the containment.

    And just to save people some time, a self contained, internally inertial imbalance will not provide thrust either.

    I would also like to encourage you to keep trying.
Sign In or Register to comment.