PUNE, DECEMBER 13 : The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) is planning to conduct ground tests for the countryÂ’s first flight version of a Supersonic Combustion Ramjet (Scramjet) engine in Hyderabad next year. This is will be followed by the first Scramjet flight test in 2008.
The design of a flight version of the Scramjet engine is on and it will be ground tested in 2007, followed by a flight test a year later, Chief Controller R&D (Service Interaction), DRDO, Dr Prahlada, told The Indian Express on the sidelines of a conference on ‘Air Breathing Engines and Aerospace Propulsion’ at the Defence Institute of Advanced Technology (DIAT) here on Tuesday.
As per plan, the flight test will be carried out onboard an indigenous platform, a prototype of which has already been developed by DRDO. “The vehicle will be 7-m long and we have already developed a prototype for the test. It will enter a 20-second long flight to go up to mach 7,” Dr Prahlada said. DRDO has already ground tested a scramjet engine to speeds in excess of Mach 2, he added. A Scramjet engine makes it possible to design smaller, lighter and faster aircraft as it takes oxygen needed for fuel combustion from the atmosphere itself instead of carrying liquid oxygen. |