Mechanics · Vol. I|Jet engine|1937 (Whittle run); 1939 (von Ohain flight)

Jet engine

1937 (Whittle run); 1939 (von Ohain flight)

A jet is a gas turbine that throws exhaust backward so the plane goes forward. Whittle patented and ran one; von Ohain’s engine flew first. Jets like high, cold, thin air — the opposite of pistons. They made the ocean a day trip and the stratosphere a highway.

Frank Whittle; Hans von Ohain · Britain and Germany

Jet engine — Original plate drawn for this atlas. Not a photograph of a museum object or a copyrighted portrait.

How the mechanism is arranged

Suck, squeeze, bang, blow: compressor, combustor, turbine, nozzle. The turbine pays for the compressor.

How it works

A compressor packs incoming air.
Fuel burns in that air; temperature and volume jump.
Hot gas spins a turbine (which drives the compressor) and blasts out the nozzle as thrust.

Why it mattered

Enabled practical high-speed, high-altitude flight.
Shrank intercontinental travel.
Demanded new alloys that later served power plants.

What it unlocked

For further study

Royal Air Force Museum. Whittle engines.
Constant, The Origins of the Turbojet Revolution. History of the idea.

Check

What two jobs does the hot gas do in a turbojet?