Posted on 03/27/2010 7:27:30 PM PDT by ErnstStavroBlofeld
Air Force Maj. Michelle Coghill confirmed both of the military aircraft's engines used the biofuel for Thursday morning's flight at Eglin Air Force Base near Valparaiso, Fla., the Dayton (Ohio) Daily News reported.
The Air Force said the flight represented the first time all of a military or civilian airplane's engines were fueled by a biofuels blend.
The test flight represents part of an ongoing Air Force effort to develop and test biofuels. The Daily News said officials from both the Air Force Research Laboratory and Aeronautical Systems Center at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base oversaw the test flight.
Unlike conventional jet fuel, biofuels burn cleaner without compounds like sulfur. Yet without such ingredients, biofuels are less stable and provide limited engine lubricating capabilities.
University of Dayton Research Institute official Dilip Ballal, whose Ohio institute is working on fuels and combustion research, said a suitable solution was a blend of biofuels with conventional JP-8 jet fuel.
(Excerpt) Read more at upi.com ...
Our military is great! They are genius! They have finally figured out what to do with all the sh!t they have to take from our Commander in Chief!
Ping.
That is probably next. They are already using 50/50 FT for all our bombers.
“They are already using 50/50 FT for all our bombers.”
No, they’ve only had one flight test of a B-52 with 50/50 Fischer Tropsch/JP-8. They’re moving towards it, though.
If performance is better, then do it, otherwise forget it. Well, I do agree with testing it for 6 or 7 years on airfarce 1, as long as the pilots and aircrew have parachutes.
I love the smell of french fries in the morning ... it’s the smell of victory!
SECAF certifies Fischer-Tropsch synthetic fuel blends for B-52H
Secretary of the Air Force Michael W. Wynne announced the completion of the Air Force’s certification of Fischer-Tropsch fuel blends in the B-52H during a signing ceremony here today.
The signing ceremony certified that the blended FT and JP-8 fuel is safe for operational use in all B-52H aircraft and marked the formal conclusion of testing.
“The demonstration approach approved by Secretary Wynne in April 2006 identified five execution steps,” said Maj. Gen. Curtis Bedke, Air Force Flight Test Center commander. “The final execution step began on Sept. 19, 2006. A B-52 was flown at Edwards with two engines running synthetic fuel and the remaining six engines on JP-8 fuel. On Dec. 19, 2006, the B-52 was flown with all eight engines on the FT blend.”
The B-52H was chosen as the test platform because of key advantages such as its eight engines, he said. The fuel system can simultaneously isolate, carry and manage both a test fuel and the standard JP-8 fuel.
http://www.edwards.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123063849
SOSL...
You’re great at finding all of the techie stuff regarding military weaponry and developments. Been reading your posts for several years.
Wasn’t there an article or two a year or so ago about the USAF building facilities (perhaps on previously closed bases) for producing synthetic fuels and that it would significantly reduce the cost of fuel for aircraft?
Early in the morning here, so I may not have that right, but I remember reading about the start-up of the process.
IMO, it’s folley to use food crops for fuel. Just hurts the overall economy by raising consumer prices due to less supply. Biofuel hasn’t been shown to produce more or equal power outage to carbon based fuels and it costs more per gallon to produce.
The idiots in charge of this movement are like characters from the tale of Alice in Wonderland.
Syntroleum, a publicly traded US company has produced over 400,000 gallons of diesel and jet fuel from the Fischer–Tropsch process using natural gas and coal at its demonstration plant near Tulsa, Oklahoma. They produce for the USAF.
Thank You very much Octex. I am gald that there are people out there who like my reading my posts. I hope that you will continue reading them.
Right, it is certified for use (in B-52s), though it is not in use yet. Back when gas was $4/gallon, this made a few careers out there at WPAFB.
“Wasn’t there an article or two a year or so ago about the USAF building facilities (perhaps on previously closed bases) for producing synthetic fuels and that it would significantly reduce the cost of fuel for aircraft?”
They are constructing a building at WPAFB in Dayton, Ohio to do just this, though the amount of fuel to be produced is more on the research level than even a partial supply for USAF operations.
I can just imagine the hypnotic smell of either french fries, or bacon grease coming out of the exhaust of jets all through the middle east.
“If performance is better, then do it, otherwise forget it. Well, I do agree with testing it for 6 or 7 years on airfarce 1, as long as the pilots and aircrew have parachutes.”
FT blends have better thermal performance (freeze point and so on) and better emissions performance. The lack of polymers and large molecules leads to less wax deposition and buildup in the injectors, which can be a big deal (one B-52 crashed due to excessive wax buildup in the injectors). However, the main advantage, in my opinion, is that FT fuel can be generated from coal right under Colorado and Ohio and ten other states. With a big enough infrastructure, it could reduce dependency on the middle east.
6 or 7 years? We better have this fool out in three...
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