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SweetBiscuit t1_je4pmlq wrote

Reply to comment by Xeroque_Holmes in The Swiss hypersonic hydrogen jet aiming to fly between Europe and Australia in 4 hours by mancinedinburgh

>even industry giants as Airbus are having trouble tackling.

It's still their main priority, the only thing they've mentioned will be challenging is the lack of a hydrogen economy - which you'd hope will be up and running by 2035 anyway.

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Xeroque_Holmes t1_je4qaja wrote

> the only thing they've mentioned will be challenging

There's plenty of challenging aspects, from the lack of inside knowledge in the company to the fact that H2 occupies 4x the space of regular fuel, is non-conformal, requires cryogenic storage and all sorts of new systems. Which in turn will probably make the aircraft manufacturers to shift to some sort of BWB configuration to be able to store all this volume and still be economically viable. Which in turn poses a myriad of other questions from manufacturing to certification to airport infrastructure itself.

Even Airbus is not pulling this any time soon, lol. Airbus real main priority right now is still single aisle ramp-up, the backlog is huge and the level of digitization is still lacking. We might see an H2 aircraft the size of an ATR at a prototype level, but I really doubt we will se anything concrete beyond that in the next decade.

> the only thing they've mentioned will be challenging is the lack of a hydrogen economy

And of course they are not advertising their weak points to the public, lol. On powerpoint everything is beautiful, but manufacturers have plenty of failed projects like this one. Boeing bet a lot on supersonic, BWB and transonic concepts that never materialized. At this point there are WAY more questions than answers, and SAF might be a much safer bet.

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SweetBiscuit t1_je4t8jg wrote

I know there are hurdles to overcome, just like any new technology.

But was just curious as you said "Airbus are having difficulty tackling hydrogen" and then later admitted that no company would advertise any issues. So basically your source was "trust me bro", and I expect no different from the anti hydrogen morons on Reddit.

I am a marine engineer, working with fuels is basically my entire job. I am aware of its physical properties. But hydrogen is happening, whether Reddit likes it or not

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Xeroque_Holmes t1_je4ucj4 wrote

Yeah mate, I am not doxing myself to give you any proof, but I've been in the industry. Conversely your proof that it's happening in aviation is "trust me bro". Marine applications are completely different to aerospace, you are out of your depth in this one.

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