[ExI] Skylon heat exchangers

[Keith Henson]

On Fri, Dec 19, 2014 at 4:00 AM,   "spike" <spike66 at att.net> wrote:

snip
>
> The next trick they must have solved is figuring out how to make this heat
> exchanger stand up to a shock wave.  Now that's technology indistinguishable
> from magic.

The heat exchangers are not exposed to the shock wave.  The air goes
through two shock waves on the way into the engine so it's all
subsonic when it goes through the heat exchanger.

I spent a lot of time with the spreadsheets for the climb through the
atmosphere.  What they do is fly up the constant pressure line.  The
air pressure inside the engine is about half an atmosphere all the way
up.

Keith