Flight Testing Designs in HEXAFLY-INT for High-Speed Transportation

Abstract

Civil high-speed passenger transport only makes sense when deployed for long-haul intercontinental flights. Consequently, the related development and deployment of such a high-speed vehicle will most likely demand an international approach. The internationally funded HEXAFLY-INT project is a first step in the direction of civil high-speed transportation along with an international development where flighttesting is the focal point. The global aim is to flight test an experimental waverider-based vehicle concept above Mach 7 to verify its potential for a high cruise efficiency during a free-flight. In parallel, the concept will also be flight tested to prove the waverider concept is also able to take-off, to accelerate to subsonic speed and to land in an efficient and robust way. The feasibility for a 3m long vehicle was demonstrated during the European precursor project HEXAFLY. Its realization is now being enabled on an international scale preparing the grounds for global cooperation in case of a future deployment of a high-speed cruiser. These flight opportunities will increase drastically the Technology Readiness Level of developments realized in previous high-speed EC projects such as ATLLAS I & II and LAPCAT I & II. The present paper describes the various numerical and experimental investigations carried out so far by the different international partners.