Video TRANSCRIPT & EXACT TIMES of statements (FORMER SR-71 PILOT) ....... "J58s PULLED him through the air more than the turbines pushed!".
Did he just know how to fly it and not understand the engine's physics for thrust..?
Hi TrumanHW,
I should think all Blackbird pilots were exceptionally well qualified and understood the engine's physics better than yourself.
If you read all the previous posts including
Post #8, Brian Abraham explains that "During high-speed flight in the Blackbird, compression of air in the inlets generated most of the vehicle’s thrust. At Mach 2.2 the inlet produced 13 percent of the overall thrust with the engine and exhaust ejector accounting for 73 and 14 percent, respectively. At Mach 3 cruising speeds the inlet provided 54 percent of the thrust and the exhaust ejector 29 percent. At this point the turbojet continued to operate but provided only 17 percent of the total motive force."
Later he explains that this was only possible because the J58 "vacuum cleaned" the high pressure from the back of the inlet. The "thrust" they refer to is that which is transferred into the airframe by various parts of the inlet, engine and exhaust ejector.
See also
M2Dude's explanation of Concorde's power plant.
"The engine itself now only generates 8% of the total thrust, a mere shadow of its subsonic glory. The now divergent secondary nozzle produces a sizeable 29%, this being produced in a similar way to how the intake subsonic diffuser produces its thrust. (The main difference in the case of the secondary nozzle is that instead of a subsonic decelerating flow, we now have a supersonic accelerating flow). A huge 75% OF THE TOTAL THRUST is produced by the intake subsonic diffuser section, this being due to the huge rise in static pressure that is occurring in this section. The 'negative thrust' from the forward ramp section this time is 12%, produced by the supersonic compression forces acting on the divergent section of the intake, resulting in an intake thrust component of 63%. So it can be seen that the vast majority of the Mach 2 thrust forces are transmitted to the airframe not via the engine mountings, but via the mountings of the intake, and to a lesser extent the TRA nozzle. It might seem that the two cases, and in particular the latter one, are very demeaning to the role of the engine, but nothing could be further from the truth. By the laws of conservation of energy, thrust (or any other force for that matter) cannot be created out of thin air, the whole process is about maximising the powerplant thrust that is potentially 'on tap'. (O.K. I know, this entire subject is about providing thrust from thin air!!). Without the engine, the entire process of course falls apart and all components of the powerplant produce exactly the same amount of thrust - ZERO! It is also doubtful if any engine currently in existence could do the supersonic job anywhere near as effectively as the OLYMPUS 593. (Not bad for a design that can be traced back over fifty-four years!). The 593 produces the necessary gas flows to produce these stated levels of thrust, and in the final analysis all powerplant thrust of course is really generated by the engine, what we have been looking at how this thrust is transmitted to the airframe."