New Hydrogen Engine Test Shows Future of Aviation

An anonymous reader writes to mention Boeing has successfully completed tests for the engine that will power HALE, the new prop plane that will be able to stay aloft for long periods of time. "The wünderengine, developed by the Ford Motor Company, went for three days under the simulated conditions of a 65,000-feet flight, which is definitely better than a Taurus and apparently exceeded their expectations on fuel economy. Chris Haddox at Boeing's Advanced Systems said that while it will be several years before HALE flies, the key to this aircraft is the propulsion system and this recent test was very promising."

Comments

Curious now...

[LiquidCoooled]

What sort of mileage does a Taurus get at 65000 feet?

Re:Curious now...

[achilles777033]

65000 ft/tank. None of them managed to keep moving after that.

Re:Curious now...

[jo7hs2]

Well, mine got around 26mpg at 5,000ft, and around 28mpg at 0ft, so I can only assume that it would get exactly 2mpg, subtracting 1mpg for every 2500ft. But your mileage may vary.

sounds like it will be a really hot technology

[User 956]

New Hydrogen Engine Test Shows Future of Aviation

Oh, the humanity!

Re:sounds like it will be a really hot technology

[Anonymous Coward]

While I did laugh, at that comment, let's remember that it's generally accepted now that the Hindenburg burned because of its highly flammable zinc skin, not because of the hydrogen fuel. In fact, hydrogen rises and evaporates so quickly that lives may have been saved because it didn't hang around and burn downward. A lot of people survived.

Re:sounds like it will be a really hot technology

[Mattintosh]

The skin wasn't zinc, and it wasn't zinc that caused it to burn.

The skin was cotton, and they painted it with aluminum/iron-oxide paint. Basically, liquid thermite. Poof!

From the Wikipedia entry:
The duralumin frame was covered by cotton varnished with iron oxide and cellulose acetate butyrate impregnated with aluminium powder. The aluminum was added to reflect both ultraviolet, which damaged the fabric, and infrared light, which caused heating of the gas.

The explosion happened when it was trying to land during an electric storm. The cotton panels were held to the frame with rope cords which were not painted with the same metal-saturated varnish as the panels themselves. When they dropped the grounding cable during the landing approach, all built-up static from the panels jumped to the frame, sparking the "thermite" varnish. The rest is history.

And you're right about how the use of hydrogen likely saved lives.

Re:sounds like it will be a really hot technology

[hardburn]

Germany *had* to use hydrogen; the Allies, in part of the long pissing-contest that lead up to WW1, wouldn't let them have any helium.

True enough. The main way get helium is to extract it from natural gas emitted from oil fields, such as the ones in Texas. Thus, the United States is one of the few countries with an abundance of helium.

They had asked the United States for helium, but the US feared that the Zeppelins would be converted for war (a legitimate concern, since Hitler was already in power and beginning expansionist policies). So they used hydrogen instead.

Among other things...

[raddan]

And despite its light appearance, the aircraft will be able to carry a 2,000-pound multi-sensor payload, plus a custom fender, flame stickers for an extra speed punch and/or synthetic leather finish. ... and say, a bomb.

Hate to be the downer of the party, but that's the way our leaders think. Gain the "high ground."

Fuel economy increases with empty tank?

[Radon360]

So, the fuel economy would go up with less fuel in the tank? Is this the reason why my wife always seems to drive her Taurus around with the fuel gauge always on "E"?

You people need to stop feeding this sort of stuff to the mechanically inept. I mean, it took me two hours to explain there was no such thing as "blinker fluid" to her friend the other day.

Re:Fuel economy increases with empty tank?

[russ1337]

I mean, it took me two hours to explain there was no such thing as "blinker fluid" to her friend the other day.

If you're so clever... then what is this stuff I've been buying?!!

Great

[Colin Smith]

How much energy does it take to produce the hydrogen?

Hydrogen is not an energy source, it's an energy storage system, and not a very good one.

Re:yeah right, hydrogen is gonna save us!

[benjfowler]

It may not always be a major issue. Future generations of nuclear reactors are likely to be designed specifically to operate at extremely high temperatures, good for producing enough process heat to thermochemically generate lots of hydrogen relatively cheaply.

Old dreams, new achievements

[Mutatis Mutandis]

For aircraft developers, the advantage of hydrogen has always been that it delivers more energy per weight unit than traditional hydrocarbon fuels. The matching disadvantage is that because of its low density, it is much bulkier, so requires bigger and heavier fuel tanks. Temperature is also an issue with pro and cons. On the one hand, LH2 is very cold, so ice formation on the skin of the aircraft can be an issue. On the other hand, LH2 is still chemically stable at high temperatures that would turn fossil fuels into a nasty sludge, or even break down hydrocarbon molecules before they can be properly burned. All that always made LH2 a very suitable fuel for a big rocket or for the hypothetical Mach 4 space plane. Its use on a slow high-altitude UAV poses very different challenges.

Re:hydrogen combustion at 65,000 feet?

[russ1337]

But this of course requires oxygen to happen. Is there much oxygen available at 65,000 feet?

From ask a scientist

Question - Does air composition change with altitude in the Troposphere?

Is oxygen concentration different at an altitude of e.g. 10000m than at sea level?
-----------------
The composition of the atmosphere remain relatively constant up to the ozone layer at an altitude of around 60,000 feet (though that number does vary somewhat).

So, it appears the composition of air is relatively similar at high altitude, just there is LESS of it ... i.e the air is too thin to support most life.... Of course you can compress it so it becomes breathable, which is essentially what a commercial aircraft does to keep the passengers alive.

Re:They already have that. . .

[h2_plus_O]

I suspect that, for the problem of ordinance delivery, the Military already has superior solutions to that problem.

Yes, but they don't have ones that can hang around for a week and THEN do it (that we know of).

The ability to, say... orbit above a cave mouth for days and light up someone's world with a few 500-lb bombs whenever they stick their head out is not currently available- the closest we have to this capability is predators (which can deliver a hellfire and can stay aloft for a while but not for a week). Task a couple of these to a mission and you could keep an asset overhead for as long as there's budget- which gets you a couple of things: Instant strike capability, the ability to call in tactical strikes from in-theater assets, the ability to guide in tactical precision munitions, and multiple-strike capability from the same asset (2000 lbs is a ton of hellfire missiles, as it were- or one really big bomb, or any arrangement of 100, 250, 500, 1000- or 2000-lb bombs).