Design and Testing of a Combustor for a Turbo-Ramjet Engine for UAV and Missile Applications

An existing freejet facility was upgraded and its range of operation extended into the high subsonic regime for operation as a test rig for the development of a combined-cycle turbo-ramjet engine. A combustor was designed developed and tested as the afterburner for the turbo-ramjet engine. At subsonic speeds with the afterburner running an increase in thrust of 40% was measured over the baseline turbojet running at 80% spool speed. A Computational Fluid Dynamics model of the flow through the shrouded turbojet engine was developed and successfully used to assist in predicting the bypass ratio of the engine at different Mach numbers. Numerous recommendations were made to improve the operation of the test rig to improve the performance of the turbo-ramjet engine and refine the numerical models. These recommended improvements will extend the present capabilities to design and analyze small combined cycle engines which have an application in unmanned aerial vehicles and missiles.Naval Postgraduate School Monterey CA is the author of 'Design and Testing of a Combustor for a Turbo-Ramjet Engine for UAV and Missile Applications', published 2003 under ISBN 9781423503477 and ISBN 1423503473.