Air Force testers completed the longest single test of a jet engine in the history of the Arnold Engineering Development Complex in Tennessee, according to a release. They conducted accelerated mission testing of the B-1 bomber’s F101-GE-102 engine over the course of 11 months, running the engine for more than 2,145 hours and completing 1,504 missions, states the complex’s Nov. 21 release. “The test ran 24-hour operations, four to six days per week,” said Mike Dent, lead engineer for AEDC’s Aeropropulsion Test Branch. The testing validated the B-1 engine core’s life out to 4,000 cycles, simulating the most demanding, repetitive phases of the engine’s operation in a variety of conditions. The accelerated testing equated to “about 10 years or approximately 4,700 flight hours of actual engine usage,” said Dent.
B-21 Temporary Shelters Could Also Shelter B-2s
March 5, 2021
The Air Force's experimental runway shelter for the new B-21 bomber is large enough to cover it or the B-2, and therefore reveals no information about the dimensions of the new aircraft. Two such shelters will be evaluated, but the maker of the second version hasn't been chosen, yet.