A collaborative team of researchers are one step closer to making hypersonic flight a reality, after the successful launch of the fifth of ten rocket test flights from the Woomera Test Range in South Australia.
The experimental hypersonic rocket, called HIFiRE 5B, hit the targeted speeds of Mach 7.5, or 9200 km/h, reaching a height of 278 km from earth.
The US$54 million Hypersonic International Flight Research Experimentation (HIFiRE) is a collaboration between researchers at the US Air Force Research Laboratory, the University of Queensland (UQ), Boeing Research and Technology, and the Australian Department of Defence’s DST Group. It is one of the largest collaborative research programs currently running between Australia and the USA.
The researchers are investigating the fundamental science of hypersonic technology, and its potential for next generation aeronautical systems.
The research from the HIFiRE programs is helping develop next-generation design, assembly and pre-flight testing of the hypersonic vehicles and the design of complex avionics and flight systems.
Hypersonic flight, which refers to flights at speeds above five times the speed of sound within the atmosphere, could revolutionise global air travel and trade. Such aircraft could potentially cross the globe between Sydney and London in two hours.
The DST Group is providing various infrastructures for the program, including mechanical and electrical design software, electronic and mechanical assembly rooms, an environmental test laboratory, hardware-in-the-loop testing facility, and range equipment for flight testings.
The group is also designing and manufacturing flight test vehicles to collect aerothermodynamic data and combustion data during the flight tests.
Professor Michael Smart from UQ’s School of Mechanical and Mining Engineering said the flight placed the Australian aerospace industry on the international stage.
“The knowledge gained from these experiments will be applied to develop future flight vehicles and testing of advanced air-breathing hypersonic propulsion engines, known as scramjets (supersonic combustion ramjet),” Professor Smart said.
A total of 10 HIFiRE test flights will gather aerodynamic and scramjet data that cannot be obtained from ground tests. More test flights from Woomera are scheduled in 2017.