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This article does a terrible job at explaining how jet engines work. Spending 10 minutes on wikipedia will give you a better idea. Do look for high vs low bypas
by dorfsmay 10y ago
This article does a terrible job at explaining how jet engines work. Spending 10 minutes on wikipedia will give you a better idea. Do look for high vs low bypass. Jet engine s are fascinating, the theory behind them is fairly simple, but a huge challenge to make it happen in the physical world, high temperatures as mentioned but also extremely high rotational speed, which requires parts as close to perfection as possible, and very robust, hairline fractures in engines have resulted in plane crashes.
- ocfnash 10y agoMuch of the little I know about jet engines was sparked by my reading this wonderful article: https://www.americanscientist.org/issues/pub/each-blade-a-single-crystal https://www.americanscientist.org/issues/pub/each-blade-a-si... (which happily is _not_ paywalled). In particular I learned that each blade is a single crystal! I still find this absolutely mind boggling.
- bigiain 10y agoSome people learn in a more hands-on fashion... https://www.flickr.com/photos/bigiain/4081474667/in/photolist-7dECdT-5FyAEF https://www.flickr.com/photos/bigiain/4081474667/in/photolis... (not me, some local guy at a DorkBot meeting way back when...)
- azernik 10y agoI think it does a fairly good job - I read through it in about one minute, and (having already spent some time studying jet engine principles) think it got the essential concepts across. e.g. it doesn't use the word "bypass" but does explain the principle. In such a small amount of space and with the constraints on vocabulary/prior-knowledge assumptions of a mass audience, going into the design tradeoffs of different specific designs is overkill.
- PhantomGremlin 10y agoI think it does a fairly good job Yes, I agree. I also loved that they mentioned something I think is really cool --- the gas stream is hotter than the melting point of the turbine blades, and yet the designers have found an ingenious solution.
- robbiep 10y agoI actually found that article to be one of the clearest explanations of how a jet engine works I have ever read. It may be exceptionally simplified but that can be a very good thing
- everybodyknows 10y agoSioux City, Iowa being maybe the most notorious, in the Western world, anyway. Or what we used to call the Western world.