Aerion: Are there supersonic business jets (SSBJ) in the future

Could supersonic travel be available again before then? 

Quite possibly, if Aerion has anything to do with it and it will be in the form of supersonic business jets (SSBJ). 

Several companies have been working on these concepts, and while the credit crunch of 2008 slowed down progress, now it looks possible that an SSBJ could be in service by the end of the decade.

It should be a lot easier to get an SSBJ project off the ground. A smaller SST is less complex, and could use off-the-shelf components such as engines, so development costs should be lower.

In addition, advances in materials, especially carbon composites, mean advanced aerodynamics can now be converted from the CAD-CAM computer to reality.

For the business customer, the appeal is clear. Rather than being tied to an airline schedule, you can fly wherever – and whenever you want.

So even if an SSBJ wouldn’t quite match Concorde’s Mach 2 performance, the door-to-door time is likely to be much faster.

And aircraft manufacturers may find it easier to persuade multinational CEOs to buy SSBJs as a productivity tool than to convince the stony-faced airline accountants to invest millions in a fleet of supersonic airliners.

The race is on
Leading the race to get the first SSBJ to market is Aerion, which unveiled its radical concept in 2007.

Unlike most SST designs, the Aerion SBJ has been designed to operate subsonically as well as supersonically.

It uses supersonic laminar flow wings – short, unswept wings, rather than delta wings favoured by most SST concepts.

Aerion says this gives it the ability to cruise smoothly at just below the sound barrier, as well as supersonically at its maximum speed of Mach 1.6.

The subsonic performance is necessary as it is still illegal to operate supersonically over many land areas – such as the US, or western Europe.

With a range of around 7,500km it would be possible to fly directly from, say, Frankfurt to Chicago – flying subsonically over land and supersonically over sea.

This would take less than five hours, compared with around nine hours by conventional subsonic jet.

The Aerion SBJ uses carbonfibre composites for the wings, and a section of the wing has been tested successfully already, mounted underneath one of Nasa’s Boeing F-15 supersonic test planes.

As a result of its straight wing design and full-span flaps, typical approach speed will be 120 knots, similar to a regular bizjet, and the aircraft will be able to operate routinely from business airports with 2,000m-long runways – removing the need to join security queues at major airports.