THERMAL IMAGING CAMERA HELPS IMPROVE HYPERSONIC AERODYNAMIC DESIGNS
By Christiaan Maras, Flir
For the purpose of space exploration and aircraft technologies, researchers have explored travelling at hypersonic speeds, which entails attaining speeds over Mach 5, more than five times the speed of sound. This puts a huge strain on the aerodynamic and thermal designs of vessels and components. To test components and their capability to withstand airflows at such velocities, the University of Manchester in the United Kingdom have combined their hypersonic wind tunnel with a thermal imaging camera from FLIR Systems.