Andrew Haas

3/3/16

Senior Project Research Paper

Throughout history people have continually developed more efficient and more powerful
engines. Jet engines were a vast improvement compared to any of the previous designs. There are
many different types of jet engines that have been developed throughout history. pulsejets were
one of the earliest types of jet engines. Although pulsejets are older than many other types of jet
engines and arent used very often, I want research if they can be improved and if they are still
useful.
Before I describe how pulsejets could be improved or if they are still useful, I should
explain what a jet engine is and what the differences between the different types are. A jet engine
loosely defined as an engine that uses jet propulsion for forward thrust. Jet propulsion is defined
as the propulsion by the backwards ejection of a high-speed jet of gas or liquid. Commonly, a jet
engine is loosely defined as an internal combustion airbreathing jet engine. The many different
kinds of jet engines include turbojets, propfan, ramjets, scramjets, and pulsejets. Turbojets are
gas turbine engines that compress air and then mix fuel with the compressed air which it then
burns and the hot pressurized air goes through a turbine and creates thrust. Propfans are jet
engines that use a gas generator to power a fan which produces the majority of the thrust.
Ramjets are made up of three sections: an inlet which compresses incoming air, a combustor
which injects and burns fuel, and a nozzle that expels that hot gases and produces thrust. These
engines require relatively high speeds to work. Scramjets are very similar to ramjets. The main
difference between scramjets and ramjets is that scramjets do not slow any of the incoming air

when combusting fuel which allows them to work at higher speeds than a ramjet. Finally
pulsejets are a type of jet engine that have non-continuous combustion. Instead of constantly
combusting, pulsejets combust their fuel intermittently. Pulsejets can use valves to bring in fresh
air or can be valveless.
Valved pulsejets use a valve to control the expanding exhaust. The valves close when the
fuel combusts due to the pressure of the expanding gases that are being created. This forces all of
the exhaust to flow through the tailpipe of the engine. The exiting gases create a vacuum in the
chamber of the engine which in turn pulls open the valves to let fresh air. Fuel is then injected
and the fresh air is used in combusting the fuel once again. This cycle repeats many time in one
second. Valveless pulsejets work a little differently. Valveless pulsejets work by combusting the
fuel in the chamber and creating a hot pressurized gas. The gas is then exits through the exhaust
pipe just like in a valved engine. The difference is that the the fresh air enters through a second
smaller pipe. The fresh air is pulled through the smaller pipe after all the hot gas has left the
chamber. New fuel is also added after the combustion. Some of the hot gas is pulled back into the
chamber and ignites the new fuel and fresh air, the cycle then repeats. The first working pulsejet
was patented by V.V. Karavodin in 1906, and later built in 1907. In 1934, a man named Georg
Madelung proposed to the German Air Ministry to create a flying bomb powered by pulsejets.
This later became the V-1 Flying Bombs.
Although pulsejets seem really useful, they have their share of negatives. One such con of
pulsejets is the fact that the valves used in them break very quickly. The valves usually cannot
withstand the vibration and forces that the engine creates. Although valveless pulsejets do not
have this problem, the valved ones do. Another large problem with pulsejets is that they reach
extremely high temperatures relatively fast. This is due to the fact that pulsejets are extremely

efficient at transforming fuel to heat. Because of this they must be made out of heat resistant
materials. Pulsejets are also extremely loud. The constant cycles of the pulse jet create a lot of
sound, which is one reason that they are not used that often. With this problem comes the
problem that they are not very stable. Pulsejets have very high levels of vibrations when they
run. Finally the biggest drawback to pulsejets is that they have a very low fuel efficiency. This is
due to the fact that a lot of the energy gotten from the fuel is turned into heat.
Pulsejets also have plenty of positives to them. For instance, they have a very good
weight to thrust ratio. This is due to the fact that they arent made of very much. Another positive
is that they can produce thrust while stationary. Some other jets such as ramjets and scramjets,
must be moving in order to produce thrust. Pulsejets can also run on almost any kind of fuel,
whether it is a gas, liquid, or particulate such as sawdust or coal powder. Lastly the biggest
advantage of pulsejets is that they are very simple to build and low cost. This is due to the the
simplicity of the engine in how it doesnt need any moving parts.
One big way to improve pulsejets is to improve their biggest downfall, their fuel
efficiency. One way people have thought to do this is to compress the fuel and the fresh air
before it is ignited. Unfortunately this solution is hard to achieve. Although many people have
created designs to try and solve this problem, none of them have shown significant increases in
thrust. Another way that people have thought of to solve this problem is the addition of a thrust
augmentor. A thrust augmentor is a device placed in the exhaust to create more thrust. In its
simplest form, it is practically a divergent cone into which the exhaust is shot. The last way to
improve pulsejets is by using a timed fuel injector. Many pulsejets are extremely inefficient due
to the fact that fuel is constantly being injected into the chamber which create an excess of fuel.

This causes a lot of fuel to not be burned and be wasted. The timed fuel injector while only inject
fuel at certain times which will cause less fuel to be wasted.
Overall, although pulsejets arent a recent invention, they can be improved. Although
they arent often used, they still show promise in the future. They are still useful today due to
their efficient fuel to heat ratio, and their ability to use almost any kind of fuel.

Sources

Simpson, Bruce. "Increasing Pulsejet Efficiency." Increasing Pulsejet Efficiency. 8 Nov.

2002. Web. 13 Mar. 2016.
"jet propulsion". Dictionary.com Unabridged. Random House, Inc. 13 Mar. 2016.
<Dictionary.com http://www.dictionary.com/browse/jet-propulsion>.
"Jet Engine." Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. 13 Mar.
2016. Web. 13 Mar. 2016.
"Jet Engine." Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. 13 Mar.
2016. Web. 13 Mar. 2016.
Everman, Mike. "Is the Pulsejet an Efficient Engine?" Pulse-jets. Pulse-jets, 26 Aug.
2004. Web. 13 Mar. 2016.