Dr John Williams is an engineer at Lumentum where he works on the extreme challenges of sub-millimetre scale photonic circuits. For the purpose of this conversation, however, we will be discussing John’s former role as a design engineer at Reaction Engines, a UK company that is developing the Synergetic Air-Breathing Rocket Engine, also known as SABRE.

The vision of SABRE is to build a new hypersonic engine that can operate both as an air-breathing jet engine and as a traditional rocket. This versatility means SABRE can be used as a propulsive platform for future hypersonic aircraft or to propel space planes into orbit. Furthermore, SABRE combines the unique fuel efficiency of a jet engine with the power and high-speed ability of a rocket. Having started at Reaction Engines early on when there were only two people in the design office, and later founding his own design and manufacturing company, John has many years of high-tech experience in the aerospace sector.

In this episode of the Aerospace Engineering podcast, John and I talk about:

his background as an aerospace engineer
the benefits of an air-breathing rocket engine
the particular design challenges in realising this type of engine
and his lessons learned from high-tech development





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Selected Links from the Episode

Reaction Engines webpage
The SABRE engine: REL, WIRED, Wikipedia
Precooler test at Mach 5
The Three Rocketeers BBC documentary
Lecture by Alan Bond, co-founder of Reaction Engines
Carbon nanotube composites