3 ms·
Not sure if I'm understanding you right, but this isn't really a fundamental difference between piston "prop" engines and turboprop "jet" engines. The mechanica
by teraflop 12y ago
Not sure if I'm understanding you right, but this isn't really a fundamental difference between piston "prop" engines and turboprop "jet" engines. The mechanical design of the combustion chamber is very different, but in both cases, the combustion produces mechanical energy, which spins a fan, which propels air backwards.
- ethbro 12y ago(I-am-not-an-aerospace-engineer) I was thinking the fundamental difference would come from viewing rocket vs prop from the mass perspective you outlined in your previous comment. In a rocket, and also in the various derivatives of a jet engine, forward thrust is generated by the expansion and acceleration of mass away from you. Either fuel + oxidizer in the former, or fuel + compressed air taken from the atmosphere in the latter. And the corresponding effect of that fuel+ acceleration on your mass. In a prop, forward thrust is generated by linking a powerplant to a blade that interacts with air. The exhaust mass from the powerplant burning fuel in this isn't directly connected to the forward thrust. In that, if you had a non-propeller method of propulsion, you could hook the powerplant to that and still have effectively the same system.