SKYLON - The dream - Prof Simon

Alan Bond and Reaction engines have passed a major milestone by completing their air coolant stage test. The SKYLON single stage to orbit, space plane could soon become the most cost effective satellite launch platform around. Prof Simon tells the amazing progress, Reaction Engines have made.
Thanks to BBC, Alan Marlow and Reaction engines for archive.
Prof Simon
Patron link: / profsimon

[@richardfroud8970]

I was lucky to work for Alan Bond in the 1980’s. A very great man.

[@Kanives1]

as I been watching "Space Stuff" since Mercury, I hope I am still alive once this all comes to happen! Thank you! :D

[@Flapjackbatter]

Interesting tecnology. I don't think we will see single stage to orbit soon. Not in our lifetimes. It's just too far away. The extra cost to cool and compress the air. The complexity. There might be one of those things that go to prototype. Not more though. But hey. Even I have known to be wrong : ) I was wrong about space x being able to land their boosters. Edit: Some of the things the skylon people are talking about. I don't know. I don't know what a university looks like on the inside. But call me Thomas. Interesting film though. Very well made. As usual.

[@CocoaBeachLiving]

I too would love to see this before I can't 👍

[@gliderrider]

David Wright - Well this is so exciting. But I’m running out of time to see it.

[@pereraddison932]

Flapjackbatter ... yay! Thomas! You did say to call you Thomas... anyhoo... from multiple simplicity... to ultim8 complexity... GOD BLESS EVERYONE BLESS EVERYTHING ALWAYS AMEN signed... the ROCK OF PHAGES

[@Kanives1]

@@gliderrider I hear you. Me too; advanced age problems are getting pretty bad. Doc recently told me I have a 2-3 year life expectancy so get my affairs in order. Bummer man. Oh well, seen a lot in my lifetime including all the early space missions. Guess it will be left up to the new generation to take over. Take care my friend. =David

[@TheGreatDrAsian]

These engines are a lot of fun to play with on Kerbal Space Program! I've designed MANY SSTO's using them, and stable re-entry has to be the hardest part of the overall designs. You have to make sure your center of lift is behind the center of mass, but not too much, and you need to make sure you have a proper amount of variable drag in the back to give yourself a shuttlecock effect. There couldn't be a more perfect game to teach rocket science and play with all the possibilities you can come up with. 6062 hours and counting.. not including the time playing the alpha and beta pre-releases. Time well spent, rocket science rules.

[@deadfreightwest5956]

Thank you for reminding me about Reaction Engines. When I first heard of them, I thought, "now this is a company that may very well be on the cutting edge of the future flight."

[@JT-si6bl]

I love that fabulous engineering phrase, 'make the trig work'. Usually when trig works, it also looks cool asF

[@ianwinter100]

That is exciting!!! Good luck Alan Bond & Co and thanks Prof Simon for this video :)

[@Lincsjoker777]

Wow i could listen to Alan Bond talk all day. What an interesting and knowledgable guy.

[@stevenbuckley1416]

Thank you very much for that. professor Holland.👍

[@TheHexCube]

Love you Prof Simon! Awesome educator. ❤

[@fukhue8226]

The British also paid no attention to Frank Whittle when he built Britan's first Jet Engine. Looks like they are doing it again.

[@ProfSimonHolland]

Sadly true

[@fabmanly1070]

That is not true, the US forced the English to give up all jet technology to them after WW2. England was broke, so an easy steal for the US. Along with Project Paperclip, sick American Military was trying to completely control all military technology and dominate global warfare. Look at the Shuttle, completely redesigned for military use and NASA always being a defence department. The US are obsessed with global military domination and control. Look at Rocketlab, couldn’t get a look-in, as they were not ‘American’ told Beck to bugger off. So he came back with US investors, registered as a US company, now can’t even launch from N.Z without FAA authorisation. The US must have absolute control over space, IMC will not settle for anything less. How do you think the US has survived? War! War is money, US inc must have war. USA HAS BEEN AT WAR FOR 93% OF ITS ENTIRE EXISTENCE! THE WAR MACHINE ROLLS ON!

[@jeffjames3111]

UKSA has invested tens of millions - it isn't being ignored but I agree that it could have been accelerated. Pun not intended.

[@dongiovanni4331]

@@fabmanly1070 you DO know the UK had jets during ww2? The Gloster Meteore was operational a month after the Me 262, the us had the Shooting Star, but the WAllies piston craft were much more mature than the early jets and were scoring victories against them.

[@fabmanly1070]

DonGiovanni of course they did, I’m not saying the didn’t. What I said was, UK tech was taken by the US as a bailout deal. I never made any suggestion the UK had no jet technology during WW2.

[@fangugel3812]

I suggest collaborating with Everyday Astronaut to making a video on this that includes experimental data on the hybrid engine. Healthy skepticism.

[@steffenfrost995]

I'd like to see a collaboration :)

[@rich3821]

A literal, STAND BY FOR ACTION! The Thunderbirds would be proud!

[@ProfSimonHolland]

Skylon is GO

[@crashdoctor]

@@ProfSimonHolland F-A-B!

[@ScrotusXL]

Rich yesss! But standby for action always reminds me of Stingray! Followed by frenetic bongo playing😂 or did I just imagine it?! “Mariiiina Aqua Mariiiina...”🧜🏻‍♀️🐠🐬

[@rich3821]

@@ScrotusXL Yes, Stingray. The phrase,"Stand By for Action" always reminds me of Gerry Anderson productions in general. Fun childhood memories. :-)

[@mhbh1979]

Great video. I went to the Isle of Wight last week and visited the batteries on the cliffs by the Needles. The new battery was converted to a rocket test stand for Black Arrow. Very interesting place, I climbed the railings and went into what I presume was the pump house for the cooling/silencing water. I was disappointed at our governments abandonment of this and many other aerospace technologies of the time. After watching this I have new hope in the future of the UK as a leading technological power.

[@donaldboughton8686]

It's not surprising that the various aerospace technologies were abandoned when one considers the scientific and technical education or lack of it of our civil servants and politicians. To my knowledge there is not one MP in the House of Commons that holds a STEM degree. Plenty of PPE, History, Law and English degrees but not one Physics degree. I am afraid that most of our MP's would have trouble finding the hot end of a operating Bunsen burner.

[@Rbprofile]

Had no idea Gary Busey was a rocket scientist.

[@Kanives1]

he wasn't bad until he bonked his head falling off that damn Harley....:P

[@bluesky284]

Richard Beranek : writer noticed that also! Could not @ the time think 🤔 of the actors name. U sir R spot on-David E.

[@agt155]

Just watch he doesn't off load it to a North Korean sub.

[@bitnik]

He didn't either *nervous hand tapping*

[@micaiaskauss]

3:49 wow, that machine also converts the air from Fahrenheit to centigrade

[@urosh911]

Made my day ! :)

[@chrisnewman7281]

Simple minds

[@quantum7401]

LOL

[@gen0megen0me93]

Lets give them even hypothetical mach 2 speed inside oxygen rich atmosphere. How would it find air to speed up 7km/s/s more?

[@cezmikaloie]

Hahahah

[@tamasmihaly1]

So glad to have found this channel.

[@ProfSimonHolland]

thanks for watching

[@martinda7446]

Big fan of this technology too. The British government should have bankrolled this years ago. Maybe the UK would now have a monopoly to LOE rather than the Russians?

[@ScrotusXL]

Great work being done by this visionary company at Wescott in Buckinghamshire at the former Bloodhound rocket engine factory. Very exciting times for a truly groundbreaking mode of hypersonic transport.

[@amodernalchemist432]

This is a necessity for human space flight. We need reusable crafts already, it's the 21st century now and rocketry is primitive. I enjoy watching your channel and the content you produce, thank you Simon✌🏼👍🏻🚀☄💥

[@ProfSimonHolland]

Many thanks

[@micki6676]

Omg,I am astounded when this actually makes sense. You are brilliant at seeking the truth in this respect. We all should study more but I definitely appreciate those who give us perspective. Go Prof!

[@bassangler73]

Thanks Professor

[@jasonplant5432]

Thank you sir. Verry informative and a great video of great info. I always knew that the problem will be solved. I am waiting for the spaceplane to literally free the population of the world.

[@martinda7446]

PS. So glad you are following the wonderful ups and downs of Alan Bond.

[@chrishunter7765]

As a past colleague of Alan Bond, both having worked on a previous heavy launch vehicle Alan knows what he is doing. This engine will be a winner.

[@martinda7446]

@@chrishunter7765 Hope he manages it soon...Would be a wonderful thing to beat SpaceX as the cheapest, quickest route to LEO. That engine could allow (Imagine..) the UK to monopolise the whole industry.

[@cowboybob7093]

Amazing stuff, the most radical intercooler possible

[@TheFineLine920]

I've come to learn that if they're talking about it now... They've BEEN using it! 😉

[@sclabhailordofnoplot2430]

@@LostAnFound x-30 was a Lougheed (next to terrible smelling plastic works) Design went out of fashion after Columbia shuttle incident. Nasa is a shell company at this point the money isn't there due to gov cuts. Shame. Oh make sure to fit a power plant and laser to the SKYLON to cut though the Kessler syndrome field. Since again space is boring.

[@davidhbedenham4951]

Brilliant to see British engineering is still producing results. Cheers

[@sylviaelse5086]

I've been following the progress of Reaction Engines for many years, hoping to see Skylon fly one day. Yet RE's home page no longer even mentions it. I suspect SpaceX's success with at least partial reusability has rather undermined the economics of Skylon, with Reaction Engines instead concentrating on engines for hypersonic aircraft. Edit from here on: I hope that this is a tactical retreat, to continue progress on the development of the engine, without potential investors worrying about SpaceX. So that once the engine is proven, the financial risks associated with Skylon will be much reduced. Airliners have been made so safe that most of us give safety scarcely a passing thought before boarding one. A space vehicle with airliner characteristics that doesn't have to come apart in flight and rely on rockets for a safe landing seems inherently safer than the alternatives. SpaceX may take the heavy lifting work for non-manned operations, but something like Skylon is surely the safest way of moving humans between the ground and orbit.

[@ProfSimonHolland]

fab company...hpe this is a breakthrough for them.

[@MostlyPennyCat]

Although SpaceX have futzed with skylons economics there's something interesting in the real numbers. I keep seeing that the real missions on SpaceX use them in expendable mode. So they seem to be more interested in throw weight, altitude, speed and reliability rather than cost. If Reaction can get decent loads up there safely and quickly with good turnaround they get the money _and_ get to reuse their spaceplane.

[@robertsmith1434]

On 25 September 2017 it was announced that the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) had awarded a contract to Reaction Engines for an undisclosed amount to conduct high-temperature airflow testing at a Colorado, United States site of a Reaction Engines precooler called HTX. I would hazard a guess as to THIS being the reason some of the publicly available stuff has gone away.

[@robertsmith1434]

Also note that it was at the DARPA facility that they did the successful test. This will radically change how space is achieved and I think we will see some really rapid development in the next five years (if they don't let DARPA bury it). Amazing breakthrough. How do they get rid of the moisture I wonder.... amazing.

[@qjo]

Greetings from sunny Florida. It's raining, so yeah I'd like to know how to deal with the moisture problem too. Maybe then I could spend less time helping defrost my sister's A/C unit. Of course the U.S.government is going to try to co-opt the development of this technology, we've got to start preparing to transport an entire governmental infrastructure into space before SpaceX and other private endeavors kick start the colonization procedure. Just wouldn't do to have an uppity group of colonists literally looking down on us and declaring independence. Need to nip it in the bud. Plus those brave bureaunauts will want to bring all of their fat children and many, many, cheeseburgers!

[@barrybrown6239]

Sometimes we forget just how incredible the human mind is and what we can achieve. Always seems funding or power is what holds us back one way or another. Love this and excited to see this all come to fruition.

[@howardmaryon-davis666]

When I was 1 years old, in 1951 my parents took me with them to visit the “Festival of Britain”, a marvellous celebration of all things British in art and science. The centerpiece of the architecture display was a huge double ended spike that was suspended on wires that made it look like it was levitating. It became the symbol of British engineering excellence, and it was called “Skylon”

[@mikeclarke952]

I bet you wet your pants when you saw that.

[@razor1uk610]

..That's where Alan got the name from, as a child/youth.

[@williamcarrington61]

Yes , l remember it well on a school visit . But l was more interested in the 4-6-2 Brit Standard steam loco !

[@AceSyntaxx]

I thought this was something from the 60's, but it's happening now! Thank god we still have some brilliant people

[@ASJC27]

🤣 That Saber jet cycle diagram at 18:47 brings back memories. About 3 years ago, while I was an Aerospace graduate student, I was the teaching assistant in a jet propulsion course. For the midterms exam the professor chose to give this diagram and have the students develop an algorithm to solve the engine cycle and get its performance. Not a single one of them managed to complete the solution within the allotted 2 hours, and not even after we gave them an extra half hour.

[@antinwo3664]

Computers do that sort of thing now a days ...

[@Darth-.-Vaper]

Plot twist: they all got the same correct answer at finals.

[@klassik68]

Love solving problems and thinking outside the box. This system makes total sense.

[@skyhiker9669]

GO BRITS! GOOOO!

[@DebacleWhimsical]

This channel is very promising! I see a great future ahead for this channel. Imagine having this wise man as a dad or grandfather making such wickedly interesting videos combined with 21st century melancholic tunes and giggles like russel brand. No more boring family weekends ever. Just endless interesting conversations. If only I had one such fascinating person in my life.... i need to get out there more often. Prof simon holland you ROCK!! Ps: I’m from holland

[@ProfSimonHolland]

You rock....best wishes, Prof Simon

[@Ed1Ward]

I'm going to adopt him as my grandfather

[@DebacleWhimsical]

@@ProfSimonHolland Thank you !! Best wishes to you too!

[@simonsmith8966]

What a great video and so well explained ! Lets hope the UK Government sees the light and put the country first for a change otherwise I can see the americans trying to nab the science for free like they did with early supersonic flight !

[@RedLP5000S]

No worries. We have a dictator in charge, bent on advancing Putin's power in the world. 🤪🇺🇸

[@brenthill3241]

The US Airforce was testing this engine several years ago kids. Have a nice day. MAGA 2020.

[@EricIrl]

@@brenthill3241 Details please - and what happened to that project?

[@nialpollitt3410]

@RedLP5000s yes, a "dictator" that can be fired at any time by a vote of no confidence or a general election. You do know that in Britain the public vote for the party not the prime minister, it's been that way for hundreds of years. And secondly it's quite obvious that you have no understanding of what a dictator is, or any understanding of how the government works in terms of leadership selection.

[@sclabhailordofnoplot2430]

Yes we did nab the wright brothers, Then German jet technology from WWII, for some reason we were in England not sure why. However seems your using the SR-71 in your plans. Cough Cough. And the SR-71 had huge cost and maintenance issues, Good luck with liquid hydrogen. Also Concord was awesome but not financially fiscal. So you made a flying refrigerator. Constellation had that for drinks. LOL water to cool skin. You and NASA would have better luck and save money going back to Saturn V. Dictator Russia was smart not to reuse re-entry vehicle. With this video i bet on China, stick to your navy. (it would be nice to have a third option tho for saving humans in space. I truly wish you luck). I really want you to read about meteorite's and solar flares since space is predictable, safe, and boring.

[@rossmain6118]

Another excellent video. Keep it up Prof!

[@topfuel29channel]

Possible launch system, focused magnetic field. The Rotating Self Detonating Engine has a lot of potential also.

[@ulor9842]

Keep doing what you're doing, you're on your way.

[@roberthogue5138]

i think this guy is Adam Savage! If not, then he must be his father.

[@puronectar4597]

I scrolled down to post the same thing you did. hahahahaha 1st time I see this guy on YT, but I loved it 12:09

[@jmsfabrication7821]

What Adam Savage would look look if he was from England!

[@Huzzahgamers_inc]

I swear I was thinking the same thing!!

[@danmallery9142]

Yep, beat me to it as well.

[@Mickorec]

Came here to say just that. lol

[@yokumato]

Great video, super interesting! It will be great to see the concept becoming reality!

[@QNFee]

it wont

[@ElijahPerrin80]

Funny I always wondered if you could remove ice from a road if you vibrate it at a frequency that cracks the ice and leaves the asphalt alone using a piezoelectric speaker and vacuum, I tried but found the resonance was too close and damaged the road but I will revisit it. So sandwich them in with a condenser you may be able to keep the crystals from forming effectively allowing it to continuing to flow into the engine instead of creating ice from atmospheric humidity. I wonder if we could just float along the edge of space scooping up enough air to run the engine like a hydrofoil over an ocean of air, I realize the separation line is more subtle than may be needed but still cool to think. The idea of bouncing off the atmosphere I would think is less favorable comfort wise like the proposed waverunner with scramjets back in the day, I like the vibration idea, I was thinking also you could break the condenser / heat exchanger into individual sections or layers that heat up for a moment to remove the ice and then freeze again once the ice is clear... this sounds needlessly complex and metal usually doesn't like heat cool cycles.

[@metatron5199]

Much simpler solution to shaking is just make all the piping surface in the condenser hydrophobic, much simpler and more robust...

[@agarceran]

@@metatron5199 Might be a very simple solution if they have cracked the fact that hydrophobic treatments rely on microscophic structures that usually are quite fragile and don't stand very well to any kind of friction for a long time. If they have cracked that it is indeed a simple solution, else this will only work for limited ammounts of time.

[@metatron5199]

Armando Silvier what are you talking about? There is a gradient drop off of atmospheric pressure as you approach the vacuum of space i.e. No need for a barrier and as well as letting everyone here know you clearly do no understand physics what so ever, literally everything you said is flat out incorrect.

[@metatron5199]

Armando Silvier if this is the first time you have ever heard that, than you have never studied any science let alone physics and the level of physics required to properly understand what is happening in these engines to begin with. Nothing is illogical about this, the only thing illogical is your own thinking process hence why you have such a hard time understanding what are actually simple concepts fundamentally. Why don you actually start where you clearly need to i.e. introductory course in all of the science bc is frightening of how little you understand but yet are so aggressive especially when all you have to say is equivalent to your wrong bc I feel a way.... yeah really thinking like a scientist there buddy, oh and btw this is exactly what we measure with instruments, so there is no speculation on the matter as we have empirical evidence which confirms what I have stated, so go ahead be in denial of reality, doesn't bother me, and while your at please go around telling people this and see how far you get with it 😂😂😂

[@Urban-Spaceman]

Fascinating stuff. Thank you.

[@ProfSimonHolland]

thanks for watching Moz Fan

[@bmobert]

Their intercooler uses alcohol in the airstream to keep it from freezing up. Sorry. I don't have the URL of where I read this but it's not a guess. If they put these engines on a Black Horse style vessel (stage and a half, where the orbiter refuels in the air) they could orbit twice the payload for the same mass of craft.

[@ProfSimonHolland]

Thanks

[@magnox72]

Amazing to see a return of HOTOL. My father worked for BAE and was slated to be part of the project and was really disappointed when it was cancelled. Hopefully the government won't sell it off to the U.S.

[@williamambrose3947]

that was really interesting professor Alan Bond i could listen to him for hours so have they got any further ? update please professor

[@ProfSimonHolland]

I will do updates...reaction engines are going places with their thermal management system.

[@Ed-zv8ot]

@@ProfSimonHolland Hello there Prof Simon, I have had a thought which perhaps with your knowledge and understanding could be explored further. Q. Can the Skylon vehicle with its large payload doors be used to transport nuclear waste off planet...perhaps to a lunar storage facility? Is the obvious and inherent danger of current rocket technology exploding on launch or during flight in earths atmosphere the only real obstacle. Skylon looks like a great option to me with its conventional take off. Great channel by the way. Kindest regards Ed in New Zealand

[@PatchouliPenny]

@@ProfSimonHolland excuse my ignorance, I'm nowhere near a scientist so this could be a really dumb question but that beautiful black spaceplane in the making, is there any reason it can't re-enter the atmosphere sharp point first, reducing a lot of surface area burning and then level out as they slow down?

[@steffenfrost995]

That would make the pointy end even hotter I think. They need the surface area to slow down.

[@MostlyPennyCat]

@@PatchouliPenny There's a few problems. The biggest is this idea of slowing down. If you're pointy end first, you're not going to slow down. Or more accurately, the pointy end will melt long before you deorbit. Another problem is people don't understand what low earth orbit is. Everybody thinks you're "way up there in space" You're not, at the scale of a planet painted on your wall the ISS in LEO (low earth orbit) is so close to the surface it looks like it's sitting on the ground. Now at to that the fact that anything in LEO is going 25 times the speed of sound to stop it from hitting the earth (orbiting) _Finally_ you consider aerobraking several tons from Mach 25. The _only_ way to slow down is to convert all those megajoules of kinetic energy into heat by friction with the atmosphere. If you go pointy end first, you won't show down at all and melt. Blunt bodies present the largest friction surface and the idea is to "hide" behind it. Skylon will be light and low density on the way back in (it's an empty fuel tank at this point) So, light weight means less KE (kinetic energy) Less KE means less atmospheric friction hearing. Bit of active cooling for the sharp bits, job done.

[@007floppyboy]

I got a job there as EC&I engineer but had to turn it down, gutted, absolutely gutted. Glad to see them doing so well. It will put SpaceX and others on the dark side of the moon. Keep up the good work guys.

[@ryanm9371]

UK :spends billions on research and development China: crtl + c

[@radwizard]

Killing me bro. Exactly what has been happening.

[@AKlover]

@@radwizard Prohibit people from Chinese dissent from working in your tech industry and don't do business in China.

[@suburbia2050]

@Yen Tao lol prick.

[@claudiohess7692]

Alan Bond gave us such a long explanation!! Thanks professor Simon!!

[@roostertn]

Deicing : Alternating Electrostatic charges, keep the water molecules disassociated and moving.

[@ProfSimonHolland]

Brilliant

[@antinwo3664]

Interesting . . . you know certain things don't you? ...

[@phamnuwen9442]

Interested idea. I read somewhere that it was simply antifreeze injected in the intake though...

[@roostertn]

@@phamnuwen9442 yikes! Sounds kinda messy. But for some reason understood the cooling apparatus to go well below the operational limits of antifreeze compounds. Perhaps I should go and read more articles on the cooler then.

[@numnut1516]

Pham Nuwen I’m not so sure that would work. The antifreeze would be injected in to the airstream before the cooling so wouldn’t the heat of the air at the very least vaporize and at worst damage the chemical solution of the antifreeze? Even if that doesn’t happen wouldn’t the extreme cold of the cooler freeze it anyway? And if temperature range isn’t a problem for the antifreeze, wouldn’t the weight of it be a rather large issue? (pun intended) with how much air is moving through those engines you would have to use A LOT of antifreeze, and it would just be getting dumped overboard. Unless the antifreeze is also part of the fuel mixture for the air breathing portion I don’t see this happening... maybe that’s how they did it? I don’t know any of the numbers here, just food for thought.

[@modulator7861]

This is really cool. Great film!

[@ChrisFlynnProductDesigner]

Its a rare thing to hear an engineer who is clearly outstanding in his field. I suspect the Chinese will be first onto this. I was wondering what Elon musk could do for them as investors? £10m is highly restrictive budget for re writing rocket science and jet engines in one single project! Top vid thanks proff

[@BigPimp238]

He has looked at this. He doesn't see single stage to orbit and space planes as worth pursuing.

[@suburbia2050]

To be fair its only at testing stage of an untried tech. Very difficult for short term profit investors like Musk to get involved.

[@mervynsands3501]

Wonderful stuff to muse on, now we need someone to put the funding into it in order to get it off the ground. The principle appears reasonably sound and a viable one. Now we have to wait to see who will take it up. The most cost effective approach to orbital access I've seen in many a year. Thanks Prof Simon for rekindling my interest in this subject. Thumbs up! 😉👊👍

[@JohnnyWednesday]

Even if the Skylon never flies? their pre-cooler is an absolute revolution - the Americans have paid a fortune to get their hands on it. Tests were successful a year or two ago? It's applicable to many engine designs - by now? a prototype is almost certainly being tested on hyper-sonic test vehicles within the upper echelons of secrecy.

[@ProfSimonHolland]

I am sure it is popular

[@jaredgarbo3679]

@ClickNSpam It would be cool to have a fighter jet which can turn into a rocket and even fly into space in less than 30 minutes.

[@TBullCajunbreadmaker]

X47-B how do people think that the US is doing in their experimental space plane over the last several years? How much new data does one think that they have gained in all of the months and months of such a publicly known space craft's operations. We the general public have absolutely no knowledge of just what they are doing up there in such long duration flights and how many experiments do you think you can do to gather information about technology that we don't know anything about? Believe the guy who said it before in the comments: If they are talking about the feasibility and the operation of such a design then they are just allowing the faintest slivers of what probably has been operational for some years now. They are always 30-50 years ahead of what they let us know about. there is no telling what is operational right at this minute.

[@suburbia2050]

I doubt it, what tests were successful? Only lab tests of the cooler on a small scale and then Mach 3.5 recently, this is the first full-scale Mach 5 mockup test. Jumping from this to powering a vehicle is going to take time and patience

[@TheTruthPlease100]

Space will never be boring. Commonplace to get there but not boring!

[@johnsmith-iu1dv]

It’s very saddening that we have come so far with our technology just to learn that the most terrible obstacle to date is proving to be human greed, sloth, and selfishness. We have been and still are our own worst enemy...

[@radwizard]

Naw

[@alleneverhart4141]

Ok, that was your coolest video to date.

[@tonkadriver1833]

I think this is Adam from MythBusters

[@pauljs75]

The time-travel loop was a bit rough on him though.

[@cheif10thumbs]

Exactly what I thought!

[@pereraddison932]

Tonka DRIVER ... and as the yankee accent is "converted" to "english" a lithp ensues...

[@MostlyPennyCat]

This is him when he's not in make up. And not putting on his pretend American accent

[@homehobbies8528]

... another myth busted!

[@douglasrafael2734]

Thank you!!! Very good!

[@matthewakian2]

Starship looks like a silver Skylon with the engines taken off the wings.

[@zoidburg2975]

Er, no it doesn't, not even fuckin' close... lol

[@gj9157]

barely, the skylon looks more like an SR-71.

[@matthewakian2]

I should have added ‘kind of looks like’.

[@rzlx0]

8:44 I understand the point you are making, however, to clarify, the Space Shuttle only used one type of engine from launch to orbit and did not discard them, not counting the SRBs. It used three RS-25s (Space Shuttle Main Engines) that fired together through the entirety of the launch until the main tank was depleted. They were designed in such a way to function at lower altitudes while keeping their efficiency in vacuum. The two smaller OMS engines were only there to finish insertion and perform orbital maneuvers. Only the SRBs were discarded during the flight, and recovered for subsequent reuse.

[@ProfSimonHolland]

Yes I got that wrong...I should have said...engines need to be different shapes to be efficient at different stages of flight...

[@rzlx0]

@@ProfSimonHolland Appreciate the video in any case! I'd love to see this fly one (hopefully soon) day!

[@yogiguitar1]

ah skylon! its great! love it !!! its the best idea since sputnik! cant wait to see it happen! its going to give elon musk a good run for his money. ultrasonic sound to prevent iceing up the charge cooler. yeah very good guess! ive a feeling thats on the money!as for the exhaust, i would have liked to the use of an aerospike cooled with helium. ive been waiting to see something like this ! it ought to give the entire country a much needed boost! i hope the project stays under british control.it would be heartbreaking to see the americans or some other nation taking it over. the only thing needed is a cockpit for dan dare and digby; first men on mars!

[@jessiejames2155]

This -was awesome !

[@ProfSimonHolland]

Reaction engines are go.

[@jeffnelson2197]

22:55 “working on hypersonics back in the 50s and 60s”.... 🧐 makes ya kinda wonder what they came up with they don’t tell you about, I wonder...🛸🤔

[@edwardwerthner7717]

Love the graphics

[@narcissusecho7469]

I wondering what Chris Evans had been doing lately

[@timhensley1297]

I been following this for years. Hope it gets here soon. Be a game changer big time. Don't know why it taking so long.

[@ProfSimonHolland]

i think they are busy selling it in the usa

[@notacommie5415]

One of the Busey’s got themselves an Engineering degree

[@VerisimilitudeDude]

LOL I was about to say the same thing! This needs more thumbs up!

[@orsonincharge4879]

4:04 so funny

[@charanbasireddy]

Thanks for the content really appreciated for the efforts you put in sir 👍

[@maddmann]

Hi Simon

[@ProfSimonHolland]

Bonjour Randy

[@GabrielKish]

What a cool design.

[@danielmconnolly7]

Elon Musk gets a lot of his inspiration from Buck Rodgers... 🚀

[@ElijahPerrin80]

I am more a Duck Dodgers and the 24th and a half century kind of guy but Buck Rogers was awesome.

[@jukkatakamaa7274]

....and Tintin !

[@fractalelf7760]

This is a fascinating video with all the current news on SpaceX and Blue Origin, etc. its nice to see other developments in progress. That is also the coolest man-cave-office ever btw!

[@albertgerard4639]

Wow, i didn’t know adam savage was a proffessor

[@NOBOX7]

This in my opinion is the best video at describing exactly what this thing is doing , i was clueless for years , i thought it made liquid o2 using venturi effect

[@alexsmith2526]

so why not use hydrogen per oxide as fuel ??and reduce the speed of the vehicle in orbit so it dos not generate so much heat during re-entry - as in have a fuel system placed in orbit to re- fuel the ship for the retro rockets

[@jocramkrispy305]

... how would you get all that fuel into orbit?

[@Jwmbike14]

I wouldnt trust my payload on a vehicle that cant carry enough fuel to retro. Retro doesnt require much ΔV, not compared to launch. It's relatively easy to reenter when compared to reaching orbit.

[@jocramkrispy305]

@@Jwmbike14 It requires a lot of fuel if you're using retro to avoid reentry heating, as Alex Smith was suggesting

[@danielyount9812]

Happy that the groups tests have surpassed expectations over and over now. Ready to see the flight test with a basic jet engine to prove it can handle flight as proposed. The on to the real deal.

[@ghostindamachine]

Got sound :)

[@olsonspeed]

Flying to space rather than brute force rockets will have a future when the problems are all solved. Reaction Engines has accomplished what others deemed impossible, I hope to see them begin test flights very soon.

[@onwardthebrave826]

Should had this 30 year ago but was mothballed by bae and Rolls-Royce

[@sylviaelse5086]

This isn't Hotol.

[@sylviaelse5086]

@giddy Hotol wasn't going to work, and the people now involved in Sabre/Skylon realised that liquifying the air was a mistake, because of the unavoidable increase in entropy that occurs when a gas is liquified. The Sabre engine avoids doing that by cooling the air only to the vapour phase boundary. Hotol also had problems with shifting centre of gravity, which is addressed in Skylon by putting the engines on pylons, so that some of the fuel can be behind the centre of gravity.

[@jocramkrispy305]

@@sylviaelse5086 HOTOL didn't liquefy the air - the RB545 engine had all the features of SABRE. Alan Bond believes HOTOL would have worked (and would have likely shifted to a Skylon-like mid-body wing/engine arrangement on the next design iteration), had Rolls-Royce not pulled out

[@Allan_aka_RocKITEman]

Great video!

[@ProfSimonHolland]

Cheers

[@caldwellkelley3084]

Super Thanks, from an aerospace enthusiast. Mr. Bond is a very smart man and not just as an engineer. As an American I can state that the only people that could have done this were the english. There are reasons for that statement. Bravo!

[@GARYINLEEDS]

I Salute You. Kind Sir. Thanks for sharing, shared.

[@ProfSimonHolland]

Thank you

[@eagleeyez1]

this makes me even more excited for the future.

[@amphibiousone7972]

Good Stuff Boss 🤝 Hope they are successful.

[@jsdigital]

Great video as always. This is some cool tech.

[@mokobaby6181]

i like it as a military application, sub orbital launch vehicle with strike capability. very nice

[@shadowraith1]

Sabre/Skylon has been around for decades. Beginning to remind me of fusion. Just around the corner. Kudos's to anyone if it ever flies. Also the Shuttle program did not throw away engines. So your wrong on that comment. Center fuel tank yes, rocket engines no.

[@jamesworth183]

The British government and it’s associated ministries have always been useless at supporting British inventors. Not only was Frank Whittle ignored. So was Barns Wallace after the war with his delta winged supersonic aircraft and many other project, also Eric Laithwaite and mag lev rail transportation, Jeffrey DeHaviland and the Mosquito aircraft, Christopher Cockerell and the hovercraft, there was the TSR2 fighter aircraft, and oh so many others. It actually makes you weep at how they have lost so much to other counties to develop for sake of supporting research and development in the UK.

[@charlesjmouse]

I can't get over how awesome it is... ...that Gary Busy is a rocket scientist too!

[@cobrapub]

cobrapub here,ok I have spent 40 years in the astro/aero/jet/ramjet/rocket industries as a draftsmen/designer and engineer,sorry no degree just experience and yes I did a contract on the SR71 and the SpaceShuttle!I even had lunch with the father of the turbo High ratio baypass engine at GE Avendale and several SR pilots at Beal AFB!In 1981, that year I received a revelation as you did about the whole compulation of a TAV [trans atmosphereic vechical]!I wanted to reach what the SR pilots called the "HOLLY GRAIL ZONE" where there is no need for propullation at all,above 250,000 feet!The First person to talk about this was Doctor Eugene Sanger,he created the sub space orbital math used by NASA for the space programs back in 1928!Now down to facts the first thing needed to looked at in any SUB SONIC to HYPROSONIC is SHOCK,Managing the air flow in to the engine!The SR71 uses a unbelievable plumming to slow incoming air so as to not blow out the combustion cams,this is extremely dangerious it leads to a problem called UNSTART!Next there is the problem of the combustion cams design,it has not changed in more than 50 years,hence the slow and low inefficient use of the Hi Ratio Bypass stator assembly!Ok next we look at supersonic to hyprosonic regement,above 50,000 feet combustion cams cannot handle this regime,now you need a modified way to combust fuel!The Aerospike showed promise,yes heat conversion is a factor but as you go higher more thrust is required!For those that have trouble understanding what I am talking about,I give you the first SONIC/HYPROSONIC Craft the BOMARC [IM99],it flew at Mach 4 in the 1950's!

[@DarthFetid]

I just love all aircraft, so was overjoyed when i saw this pop as recommended in my feed. I was further tickled pink to see that this was produced this year. Thank you for the update on SKYLON, I have high hopes (especially now) for this vehicle. Thank you professor Holland, I shall be sifting through your back catalogue.

[@robertwilson3914]

Great.

[@pjh9104]

Right again,Mr.Bond!

[@jocapt7482]

continue with the good work.

[@stevetproject]

Fascinating....👍🚀🛩

[@AtfShipping]

The pipes are made on nanoscale and are blasted with sound (aka vibration)

[@olsonspeed]

Space planes should be safer and more efficient if all the technical challenges can be solved. I wish the Skylon Team success... Godspeed.

[@davidschwartz5127]

Thumbs up!

[@lugaritzbrown2250]

Great leap forward will make space travel more feasible.

[@Mrbobinge]

Skylon and Eagle comics of 1951. We're similar age. Similarly inquisitive. You the Prof. me the techie. Both unquenched. Roy Rogers, Tex Ritter. Gunslingers always.

[@bigblue6917]

Yes I do remember Dan Dare, and Roy of the Rovers. But when I saw the SKYLON coming out of the hanger I did think Thunderbirds. I am looking forward to seeing the SKYLON fly. A whole new way to travel into space. Interesting how British heroes do not have superpowers but are just exceptionally talented.