Thermodynamic efficiency

In the gas turbine, the burning process causes the air to be heated at virtually constant pressure, in constrast to the piston engine, where the air is heated in an almost constant volume with rapidly rising pressure. The (thermodynamic) efficiency of both types of engine can be shown to depend on the pressure ratio during the initial compression process. Increasing the pressure ratio increases the maximum temperature, and the efficiency is, therefore, limited by the maximum temperature that the materials of the hottest part of the engine can withstand.

The temperature limitation is rather more severe in the gas turbine, since the maximum temperature is sustained continuously, whereas in the piston engine, it is only reached for a fraction of a second during each cycle. For a long time, this factor led to a belief that the gas turbine was so inherently inefficient in comparison with a reciprocating engine, that it was not worth bothering with.

At high altitude, the atmospheric air temperature is reduced, so for a given compressor outlet temperature, a greater temperature and pressure ratio between inlet and outlet can be allowed. Thus, the thermodynamic efficiency tends to rise with increasing altitude. This factor, coupled with the advantages of high altitude flight, described in Chapter 7, makes the high speed turbo-jet – propelled aircraft a surprisingly efficient form of transport. In fact, as we show in Chapter 7, for long-range subsonic jet-propelled transport, there is no eco­nomic advantage in using an aircraft designed to fly slowly.

The thermodynamic efficiency of gas turbines improved dramatically during the first three decades of development mainly because of progress in producing materials capable of sustaining high temperatures, improvements in the cool­ing of critical components, and better aerodynamic design of compressors and turbines.