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ISRO Successfully Test-fires Scramjet Rocket Engine (thehindu.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro), on Sunday, successfully tested two indigenous scramjet engines. India has become the fourth country to demonstrate the flight testing of scramjet engine after the US, Russia and European Space Agency.
According to a report, the scramjet will bring down the launch cost of weather satellite INSAT-3DR which is a weather forecast system designed for enhanced meteorological observations and disaster warning. The satellite scheduled to be launched in August earlier, but it has been postponed to September.
According to a report, the scramjet will bring down the launch cost of weather satellite INSAT-3DR which is a weather forecast system designed for enhanced meteorological observations and disaster warning. The satellite scheduled to be launched in August earlier, but it has been postponed to September.
You're sorely lacking in imagination. A real manly man's man would attach the scramjet to the enemy and send it screaming towards the warhead. You wimp!
Scientists say that the scramjet technology effectively cuts down the cost of launching rockets by reducing its weight by more than half
Not really. Scramjets have a limited speed range, so you need a rocket (or perhaps another type of jet engine) to bring it up to the lower limit, and then another rocket to take it from maximum speed to orbital speed. This add extra complexity, weight and drag.
Apparently India and Americah [sic] think alike. According to Dr Saraswat (the head of the program) "This is dual-use technology, which when developed, will have multiple civilian applications. It can be used for launching satellites at low cost. It will also be available for long-range cruise missiles of the future."
Indigenous means "originating where it is found", or "naturally occurring in a particular place". It can be used referring to individuals, groups of people, flora, fauna, minerals -- pretty much anything. It shares many of the same dictionary definitions as "native".
The word usage problem is using "indigenous" for an artificial, mobile invention, which is a bit unusual. You wouldn't say "indigenous airplane" because it's not something naturally found in a place or confined to a place. That would be an unusual usage, but people would understand what you meant -- you'd mean "domestically produced".
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Actually, I don't see how scramjet research could be non-military. Scramjets for launch vehicles are effectively stillborn. There's a number of cheaper, more prospective, less fancy but efficient alternatives to the use of scramjets on a launch vehicle, such as for example a combination of a ramjet and a rocket engine for a two-phase ascent. (Even PDR engine research would probably be more fruitful for non-military propulsion.)
Ezekiel 23:20
Scramjets are, by definition, air-breathing, and are therefore not rocket engines. Admittedly a nit of terminology, but the /. crowd are generally more technically/engineering minded people and those tend to care about proper use of jargon.
According to a report, the scramjet will bring down the launch cost of weather satellite INSAT-3DR which is a weather forecast system designed for enhanced meteorological observations and disaster warning. The satellite scheduled to be launched in August earlier, but it has been postponed to September.
No fucking way. INSAT-3DR will be launched on a GSLV Mk II vehicle which doesn't have any scramjets. Even more obvious should be the fact that a successful engine test now can't possibly bring down launch costs a few months later. That timeline is like an order of magnitude more optimistic than what commonly happens in aerospace.
Ezekiel 23:20
nope, the first scramjet program in USA was in 1960s but done inside testing facility
the first successful scramjet flight was done by HyShot team in 2002 by U. of Queensland, Australia