![]() The Overture is a proposed Mach 1. By 2021, it was expected to be flight tested in 2022 but delays pushed the expected first flight to mid-2023. ![]() And if for some reason it kills the argument for the 55-passenger airliner, Scholl says he could just start selling the demonstrator to wealthy aviators looking to rocket between meetings. The XB-1 Baby Boom is a one-third-scale supersonic demonstrator, designed to maintain Mach 2.2, with over 1,000 nmi (1,900 km) of range, and powered by three 4,300 lbf (19 kN) dry General Electric J85-15s. (No surprise on the latter-Richard Branson once tried to buy the Concorde fleet British Airways was retiring.) If the XB-1 proves out Scholl’s vision, it will presumably draw still more money from airliners and investors. Those two companies, though, are targeting the business jet market with smaller craft and and lower speeds of Mach 1 to 1.4.īoom’s speedier flying will undoubtedly give it extra appeal to the airlines considering it, and so far it has drawn preorders and investments from Japan Airlines and Virgin Group. Boston-based Spike Aerospace and Aerion Supersonic in San Francisco are building supersonic airplanes along similar timelines. The Lockheed P-38 Lightning is an American single-seat, twin piston-engined fighter aircraft that was used during World War II. Eventually all will be assembled into the XB-1, which the CEO estimates will fly by the end of 2019.īoom Supersonic isn’t without competition in this quest. The pieces being made in California are sent to Denver, where they’re tested for strength and rigidity. “You want thermal expansion to be matched, so that everything grows at the same rate,” explains Scholl, a private pilot who began his career in the technology world, in digital marketing with Amazon. “At Mach 2.2, the nose and leading edges of the wings will be 307 degrees Fahrenheit,” Scholl says. “Efficient inlets mean lower fuel consumption, and this lesson we’ve learned on XB-1 will help improve the operating economics of Boom’s airliner,” he adds.īoom is also using the XB-1 to hone its carbon fiber manufacturing techniques, ensuring that the pieces that will make up its plane have the not just the right durability, strength, precision, and lightness, but thermal performance at high speeds. Murphy says that in one year of work, his team has exceeded the Concorde’s inlet performance, and at higher speeds than that airplane could fly. Boom will use an adjustable inlet that adjusts airflow based on the phase of flight-more open during takeoff and landing, more constricted during high-speed cruise. That mean designing inlets that can take air moving twice as fast as sound and slow it to the subsonic speeds at which its engines can operate.
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