SCAMP: Superboom Caustic Analysis and Measurement Project Overview

Abstract

The objectives of the Superboom Caustic Analysis and Measurement Project (SCAMP) are to validate, via flight test measurements, models for sonic boom signatures in and around focal zones, and to apply these models to predict focus booms for low-boom aircraft designs. Focus due to acceleration to supersonic speeds is an unavoidable maneuver, and it must be quantified in order to assess the acceptability of overland supersonic flight. This paper provides an overview of the SCAMP project, including activities related to experimental design, planning, execution and analysis as well as the efforts in developing and improving the focused boom computational models and their application to shaped low boom aircraft operations. The flight test gathered an extensive empirical database containing flight parameters from 13 dedicated SCAMP F-18B flights which created 70 sonic boom events captured on a 10,000 ft long, 125 ft spacing, 81-microphone, high-fidelity ground-based acoustic array. Additional instrumentation included airborne microphones on a sailplane and blimp, surface and upper air atmospheric sensors, seismometers and cameras. Computational Fluid Dynamics simulations were generated for as-flown F-18B maneuvers in order to quantify the aircraft pressure flowfield and then utilized to assess, improve and validate three different focus boom models. These validated models were then applied to shaped sonic boom configurations in order to gain a better understanding of the propagation of shaped signatures through focal zones. The SCAMP team, led by Wyle and NASA, includes partners from the Boeing Company, Pennsylvania State