Refinement of Supersonic Inlets for Mach 1.4 to 2.0

The design and analysis of several external-compression inlets for freestream Mach numbers of Mach 1.4, 1.7, and 2.0 were refined from earlier designs to improve their aerodynamic performance and explore additional design aspects. The types of inlets included axisymmetric pitot, axisymmetric spike, two-dimensional, two-dimensional bifurcated, and streamline-traced inlets. The inlets were designed as isolated from the airframe with freestream conditions, engine-face geometry, and flow rates established from a reference NASA commercial supersonic aircraft concept. The inlets were designed using the NASA Supersonic Inlet Design and Analysis (SUPIN) Tool and the inlet performance was obtained from computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations. The study compared the physical dimensions and aerodynamic performance of the inlets at the on-design cruise conditions and off-design conditions involving angle-of-attack and Mach number variations. The study provides data to inform the selection of inlets for commercial supersonic aircraft.