Design and operational assessment of a low-boom low-drag supersonic business jet

Abstract

There has been a worldwide interest to develop a supersonic business jet (SSBJ) for a minimum range of 4000 nm with low sonic boom intensity and high fuel efficiency. An SSBJ design model is developed in the GENUS aircraft conceptual design environment. With the design model, a low-boom low-drag SSBJ concept is designed and optimized. This article studies the design concept for its operational performances. The sustained supersonic cruise flight is studied to find out the fuel-efficient Mach number and altitude combinations. The combined supersonic and subsonic cruise flight scenarios are studied to evaluate the feasibility of boom-free flight routes. The one-stop supersonic cruise flight scenario is studied to compare the fuel consumption and time advantage over subsonic airliners. The off-design sonic boom intensity is studied to explore the operational space assuming there would be a sonic boom intensity limit in the future. Through the studies, it is revealed that there is a corresponding most fuel-efficient operating altitude for a specific cruise Mach number. To operate the aircraft near the cutoff Mach number leads to both increases in the fuel consumption (6.3%–8.1%) and the mission time (11.7%–13.1%). The business-class supersonic transport (231 g/PAX/km) consumes nearly three times fuel as the economic-class supersonic transport (77 g/PAX/km), which is still far more than the economic-class subsonic transport (20 g/PAX/km). Off-design sonic boom intensity studies reveal different trends against the common understanding: the sonic boom intensity does not necessarily decrease as the altitude increases; the sonic boom intensity does not necessarily decrease as the Mach number decreases.