China's Hybrid Spaceplane Could Reset The 21st Century Space Race

[lovuian]

While SpaceX is making news with its recoverable rockets, China announced that it is working on the next big thing in spaceflight: a hypersonic spaceplane.

The China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation is beginning advanced research on a high tech, more efficient successor to the retired Space Shuttle, with hybrid combined cycle engines that can takeoff from an airport's landing strip and fly straight into orbit. The hybrid space plane's combined cycle engines would use turbofan or turbojet engines to takeoff horizontally from a landing strip. Once airborne, the engine then shifts to ramjet propulsion and, as speed increases, adjusts into a scramjet engine with supersonic airflow. At the scramjet stage, the hybrid spaceplane would enter hypersonic flight in 'near space', the part of the atmosphere between 20km to 100km above sea level. Finally, the hybrid spaceplane would use its rocket motors to push out of near space and into orbit.

the Chinese military could draw direct military benefits from the combined cycle engine technology. Without the rocket motor component, the combined cycle engine would be a good fit to power hypersonic UAVs and manned aircraft. Flying in near space at speeds above Mach 5, such aircraft could have global reach, while their speed and high altitude would make them effectively immune to all existing air defense systems (though the turbine part of the engine would need to emphasis fuel efficiency and high thrust to weight).

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/chinas-hybrid-spaceplane-could-reset-the-21st-century-space-race/ar-BBvvQFe?li=BBnbcA1&OCID=HPDHP