World’s fastest commercial aircraft will have revolutionary Mach-5 engine
- The world’s fastest commercial aircraft is being built
- Its unprecedented Mach-5 engine will help it hit hypersonic speeds
- That exceeds the speed of modern commercial planes by up to six times
Published on Jul 03, 2024 at 9:22 PM (UTC+4)
by Amelia Jean Hershman-Jones
Last updated on Jul 04, 2024 at 5:49 PM (UTC+4)
Edited by
Tom Wood
The world’s fastest commercial aircraft is being built – and its unprecedented Mach-5 engine will help it hit hypersonic speeds.
That exceeds the speed of sound by up to five times and the speed of modern commercial aircraft by up to six.
And it’s claimed that it will use a single jet engine.
READ MORE! The fastest-ever aircraft was a hypersonic rocket plane that flew at Mach 6.7
Who is making the fastest commercial aircraft?
Aircraft startup, Hermeus, is behind the hypersonic flight lab creating the aircraft.
Their aim is a reusable aircraft that can take off from sea level, hit hypersonic speeds, and land using one jet engine.
They are experimenting with a demonstrator aircraft called Quarterhorse.
Quarterhorse is an autonomous and small single-engine autonomous vehicle that is hoped to lead to the fastest commercial aircraft.
This is significant considering the world’s largest plane, the Roc, launched a hypersonic craft but required six Boeing 747 engines.
It was designed to test the company’s one-of-a-kind Mach-5 engine and briefly hit Mach 5 to collect data.
While they told Freethink that Freethink is currently more often than not, they had something to add.
“And every day that inches a little bit closer to success, a little bit closer and a little bit closer,” said founder, A.J. Piplica.
“And there’ll be days when we go the other direction, where we learned something we didn’t know, where we fail in a test, and we take a step back.
“We just keep moving, keep moving a little bit by bit, until we will this into existence.”
And the results would make a huge difference to the world of aviation as this hypersonic passenger aircraft concept would fly from LA to Sydney in less than three hours.
Technology behind the Mach-5 engine
The Quarterhorse is powered by a Chimera engine that transitions from a jet engine to a ramjet.
It’s the ‘world’s first commercially-developed turbine-based combined cycle engine’, per Hermeus.
“At low speeds, Chimera is in turbojet mode – just like any jet aircraft. At higher speeds, Chimera bypasses the incoming air around the turbojet and the ramjet takes over completely.”
Unlike this air-breathing engine, most hypersonic aircraft concepts are powered by a rocket engine, which maks operability, maintainability, and reliability a challenge.
Using vertical integration and existing technological components to achieve their goals, it would allow the aircraft to be produced as quickly as modern aircraft making hypersonic passenger flights a reality.
And it seems the race to hypersonic is on as this top-secret hypersonic plane was captured quietly making its first successful flight.
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All Supercar Blondie contributors undergo editorial review and fact-checking to ensure accuracy and authority in automotive journalism. After gaining her BA Hons in French and English at the University of Nottingham, Amelia embarked on a vocational diploma from the National Council for the Training of Journalists (NCTJ). This led to numerous opportunities, from interning at Vogue to being on the small team that launched Women’s Health magazine in the UK, which was named the PPA Consumer magazine of the year for three years running. As Health, Beauty and Fitness editor, Amelia personally received a Johnson & Johnson Award and was shortlisted for both PPA and BSME titles. Since then, Amelia has created content for numerous titles and brands, including the Telegraph, 111 Skin, Waitrose, Red magazine, Stylist, and Elle, as well as being Head of Content at Vitality and Editor in Chief at INLondon magazine. “My superpower is translating technical jargon about the mechanical workings of a supercar into a relatable story you’ll want to share with your friends after you’ve read it.” After joining the SB Media family as a senior journalist in September of 2023, Amelia’s role has evolved to see her heading up the SEO output of the editorial team. From researching the most ‘Google-able’ key terms to producing evergreen content - it’s been a time of hard work, growth, and success for the editorial team and the Supercar Blondie website. “I like to think of myself as a ‘method journalist’. In other words: I live and breathe whatever I am writing about. When writing about fitness, I trained as a personal trainer, and as a beauty editor, I completed an ‘expert’ in scent diploma with the Fragrance Foundation. “During my tenure at Supercar Blondie, however, I did something I never thought possible: I passed my driving test at the age of 36. One day I’d love to train as a mechanic to better understand what happens under the hood, too. “My sweet spot is providing readers with a ‘takeaway’ (read: something new they didn’t know before) after reading every one of my stories. While I don’t claim to be an expert in the automotive world, I know the experts and bodies in the field to rely on to provide our readers with an informative and thought-provoking story every time they visit the site.”
