The Efficiency of Compression in a Single Adiabatic Shock: Results of Some Calculations on the Case When No Heat is Released

THE increase of pressure in a shock wave takes place with a gain of entropy, so that the efficiency of the compression is less than unity. In this paper we give the results of some calculations of the efficiency of the compression in a single adiabatic shock wave, when no heat is released as the result of any physical or chemical changes in the flowing gas. The efficiency is defined as the ratio of the work done to compress the gas (from the static conditions ahead to the total head conditions downstream) to. the work done if the process were carried out isentropically. Results are given for two values of the ratio of specific heats, i.e. 1.40 and 1.33, which correspond roughly to atmospheric air and turbine gases respectively.