The North American Wave Engine Corporation has delivered an initial set of production J-1 wave engine systems to an aerospace prime contractor on contract with the US government. The company has multiple customers that are integrating its wave engine technology on UAV platforms as market demand grows for low cost and rapidly manufacturable propulsion systems.

Daanish Maqbool, CEO of Wave Engine Corp., says, “We are looking forward to working with our customers to increase production and bring an unmatched combination of cost, simplicity and flight performance to market.”

Wave Engine Corp. has conducted over 800 engine tests and 13 powered flights on two aircraft. The most recent flights involved the J-1 engine powering the company’s Scitor-D series of UAVs and were conducted with safety oversight from the Virginia Tech Mid-Atlantic Aviation Partnership.

“We’re grateful for the opportunity to work with a company that pushes the boundaries of propulsion systems,” says Tombo Jones, director of the Virginia Tech Mid-Atlantic Aviation Partnership. “The technology that they are working on marks an important step in advancement for the drone industry, so we were excited to have Wave Engine fly at our test site.”

Wave engines are a class of aircraft engines that operate using pressure waves instead of rotating machinery. Intermittent combustion inside a hollow tube produces pressure waves that push hot gases and produce thrust. Wave Engine Corp.’s proprietary technology enables high speeds and allows for an order-of-magnitude reduction in the cost and complexity of jet propulsion, which is a critical enabler for an increasing number of applications that call for affordable and rapidly producible jet propulsion systems and aircraft.