• Question: What would you say is your most interesting invention/design you've had a part of?

    Asked by tonyyyg99 to Al, Emma, Ivanka, James, Omar on 14 Mar 2012.
    • Photo: Al Bartlett

      Al Bartlett answered on 14 Mar 2012:

      Hello Tonyyyg99,

      Thanks for the question.

      The most interesting invention is the aircraft engine – The jet engine. It’s a feat of engineering that costs about £25million each!!

      It works by sucking in air (about as much as there is in a squash court is sucked in every second), then squeezed until compressed, then mixed with AVTUR (aircraft fuel), then ignited and blown out of the exhaust of the engine which propells the aircraft forward. It really is a brilliant concept.

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Turbofan_operation_lbp.svg

    • Photo: Emma Bould

      Emma Bould answered on 22 Mar 2012:

      I think the most interesting thing I have been involved with was when we were getting ready to deploy. We had to do a bunch of Missile Trials and then a test firing to prove that it would work if someone decided to try and harm us. (Our missile system on my ship is for self defence)

      It was really challenging, but amazing to see it work and destroy the dummy target (towed a LONG way behind an plane)….. months of hard work finish in just a few seconds!

      There is a video of something similar on YouTube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n6pwSTZtI7M

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