F-15 Hits Mach 2 on Synthetic Fuel

[unhappycamper]

F-15 Hits Mach 2 on Synthetic Fuel
August 21, 2008
Macon Telegraph

ROBINS AIR FORCE BASE, Ga. - History was made at Robins Air Force Base this week as an F-15 Eagle flew at more than twice the speed of sound using a blend of synthetic fuel.

The Aug. 19 flight was the world's first test of a high performance fighter aircraft powered by a 50-50 mix of traditional JP-8 jet fuel and a synthetic using natural gas as a source.

The Air Force already had tested the new blend on a C-17 cargo aircraft and B-52 and B-1 bombers. But Jeff Braun, director of the Air Force's Alternative Fuels Certification Office at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, conceded that fighter aircraft offered a much different challenge.

"They are much higher performance and a much more demanding environment," he said during a late afternoon interview.

Braun said the daylong process included a 50-minute ground test Tuesday morning that pushed the aircraft's engines from military power to full afterburner.


Rest of article at: http://www.military.com/news/article/f15-hits-mach-2-on-synthetic-fuel.html?col=1186032310810