Airborne Engineering Ltd (AEL) was established in 2001 to design, test, and produce airborne instrumentation. Through our work on developing a low thrust-misalignment solid propellant rocket nozzle for the QinetiQ-1 balloon, we became increasingly involved with rocket engine test and evaluation programmes.
In 2009 we moved to our current location at Westcott Venture Park near Aylesbury, the site of the former Rocket Propulsion Establishment. At Westcott we modernised and upgraded the existing infrastructure to create a state of the art propulsion test facility. In recent years our customer base has grown, and we have provided test services for rocket engines using a variety of solid, liquid, and gaseous propellants.
In 2009 we moved to our current location at Westcott Venture Park near Aylesbury, the site of the former Rocket Propulsion Establishment. At Westcott we modernised and upgraded the existing infrastructure to create a state of the art propulsion test facility. In recent years our customer base has grown, and we have provided test services for rocket engines using a variety of solid, liquid, and gaseous propellants.
Services
Our staff have a wide range of engineering, scientific and business experience, having previously worked on projects including stratospheric balloon records, aerodynamic decelerator testing, radio frequency propagation studies, meteorological radar, general aviation and various rocket engine programmes.
This test campaign studied the performance of a heat exchanger with a letterbox-shaped cross section for a single module of the HX3 subsystem of Reaction Engines' SABRE engine. This required AEL to design a custom hot gas heat source, which was capable of providing partially combusted air with variable massflow.
At our Westcott facility, we have a well-equipped on-site mechanical workshop and instrumentation lab and two rocket engine test bays covering a variety of propellants and thrust ratings up to 40kN. We are able to test at higher thrust levels elsewhere on the Westcott site if required. Each test bay has extensive data acquisition and control support, which can be extended for specific experimental requirements as necessary.
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