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Since 1993, MBDA-F and ONERA have been working with many Russian laboratories and institutes in the topic dealing with future high speed airbreathing propulsion system. Particularly, the fruitful cooperation between Moscow Aviation Institute and MBDA France goes on to prepare together a Wide Range Ramjet able to accelerate a reusable space launcher from at least Mach 3 and up to Mach 12. This work has been realized with several cooperative contracts, funded by French Government and by MBDA-France. MBDA-France and the Moscow Aviation Institute are developing an experimental wide range dual-fuel, dual-mode ramjet. The considered engine has a fully variable internal geometry which gives it a priori a high performance level over the whole Mach number range. Technology development work led to the design and partial demonstration of materials and structures solutions to comply with the variable geometry requirements. Combustion tests and other basic research have taken place for more than 7 years at Moscow Aviation Institute. These technologies should be definitively demonstrated thanks to the test of a large scale Prototype in MBDAFrance Bourges-Subdray Center (connected pipe test up to Mach 7 -entrance of combustor 212x257 mm ² ). Specific computer codes are achieved, allowing to control the Prototype and in particular to optimize its contour in real-time during the test. Numerous subscale tests have been realized (with fixed or simply moving internal geometry) in order to better understand the combustion in the regimes that would occur in a dual-fuel dual-mode ramjet. This cooperation gives also the opportunity to work together on the development of new measurement systems and of a methodology associated with hot fuel-cooled structures for WRR. This paper gives a synthesis and an overview of this common work, with consideration to all aspects.

France and Russia have an ongoing fruitful cooperation to jointly develop a wide-range ramjet (WRR) able to accelerate a reusable launch vehicle from » Mach 3 to Mach 12. The WRR engine has a fully variable internal geometry, which enables a high performance level over the whole Mach-number range. Propulsion-oriented system studies have been conducted both on 30-tons-class experimental ight vehicle and on 500 tons-class single-stage-toorbit (SSTO) reusable vehicles. In particular, the WRR airbreathing propulsion system has been integrated into a SSTO generic vehicle. Then, trajectory simulation, using mass, propulsion, and aerodynamic models, has allowed determining the payload as a function of total takeoff weight, con rming the utility of the variable geometry features of the WRR. Preliminary experimental and numerical studies have been conducted for several years to design the WRR prototype. The present contribution describes the synthesis of this engine and provides an overview of this common work. Consideration is given to various aspects of the project, including system studies, technology development, and analyses using contour control codes.