Hi everyone... you're probably starting to recognize my posts now. 
I've been working on learning the difference between various types of aircraft engines in an effort to come up with a realistic progression for my engineer character to follow in his breakthroughs wrt the aircraft he's building. To summarize that: he has the engineering plans for a bomber developed by the enemy that's supposed to be advanced in that it's got a better engine and high octane fuel (also radar and some other bells and whistles). The engineer, let's call him Sam, is going to use these plans to try to develop a fighter that's even faster and more advanced than the bombers (called Eagles, loosely based on Flying Fortresses). I've actually decided that the end result of this won't be a fighter plane at all, but rather a suit with a jetpack. Kind of like Ironman's suit, though probably a lot more retrofuturistic. But before Sam gets there he's going to try to build a fighter and he's going to test it and keep running into problems. As he tries to solve each problem he's going to improve on the Eagle's engine and the structure of the fighter (he's going to call it a Hummingbird) until he has a breakthrough and goes past trying to build a plane at all, but instead creates this suit. My original idea was to have him make a turboprop engine off the Eagle's turbojet engine, but reading more about it, the turboprop engine isn't going to give the kinds of advantages I want, and it makes more sense for the Eagle to have a supercharger and have Sam design a turbocharger, instead.
The main problem with this decision is that one issue I was having anyway is even worse: turbocharged engines weren't widely used in WWII because of how hot they got. It meant that an aircraft with a turbocharged engine had to also carry extensive tubing and an intercooler. Turbine blades would melt on early models.
So if I want my suit to be powered by a jet pack, or turbojet engine of some sort, how am I not going to melt the pilot of the suit?
I mean, it's a dieselpunk fantasy setting, so it doesn't have to be 100% realistic, but I do want it to make sense.
So I thought of possible solutions: 1) my engineer comes up with some sort of special alloy that is ultra heat resistance without being overly heavy. I'm also trying to read up on anodized aluminum but I'm not totally sure I understand the process there. Would anodized aluminum be a good material to use for the suit? Is the aluminum being anodized an alloy, or pure aluminum? Could there be some kind of alloy that could then be anodized to be even better at withstanding high temperatures that would make sense as to what this suit is made of? Like would it make sense to talk about the various metals in the alloy and emphasize the use of one or another of them as a way of dealing with the heat? I know aluminum is actually really good in this regard, as it doesn't conduct heat like some other metals do. Anyway, please give me some advice on this.
2) It occurred to me that if he could remove the need for combustion from the engine entirely, that would solve the problem of burning the pilot. Is there any way to envision a fantasy turbo engine that would not rely on burning fuel?
3) Alternately, is there a realistic way to cool the engine that doesn't require so much space? What would that cooling system look like?
I've been working on learning the difference between various types of aircraft engines in an effort to come up with a realistic progression for my engineer character to follow in his breakthroughs wrt the aircraft he's building. To summarize that: he has the engineering plans for a bomber developed by the enemy that's supposed to be advanced in that it's got a better engine and high octane fuel (also radar and some other bells and whistles). The engineer, let's call him Sam, is going to use these plans to try to develop a fighter that's even faster and more advanced than the bombers (called Eagles, loosely based on Flying Fortresses). I've actually decided that the end result of this won't be a fighter plane at all, but rather a suit with a jetpack. Kind of like Ironman's suit, though probably a lot more retrofuturistic. But before Sam gets there he's going to try to build a fighter and he's going to test it and keep running into problems. As he tries to solve each problem he's going to improve on the Eagle's engine and the structure of the fighter (he's going to call it a Hummingbird) until he has a breakthrough and goes past trying to build a plane at all, but instead creates this suit. My original idea was to have him make a turboprop engine off the Eagle's turbojet engine, but reading more about it, the turboprop engine isn't going to give the kinds of advantages I want, and it makes more sense for the Eagle to have a supercharger and have Sam design a turbocharger, instead.The main problem with this decision is that one issue I was having anyway is even worse: turbocharged engines weren't widely used in WWII because of how hot they got. It meant that an aircraft with a turbocharged engine had to also carry extensive tubing and an intercooler. Turbine blades would melt on early models.
So if I want my suit to be powered by a jet pack, or turbojet engine of some sort, how am I not going to melt the pilot of the suit?
I mean, it's a dieselpunk fantasy setting, so it doesn't have to be 100% realistic, but I do want it to make sense.
So I thought of possible solutions: 1) my engineer comes up with some sort of special alloy that is ultra heat resistance without being overly heavy. I'm also trying to read up on anodized aluminum but I'm not totally sure I understand the process there. Would anodized aluminum be a good material to use for the suit? Is the aluminum being anodized an alloy, or pure aluminum? Could there be some kind of alloy that could then be anodized to be even better at withstanding high temperatures that would make sense as to what this suit is made of? Like would it make sense to talk about the various metals in the alloy and emphasize the use of one or another of them as a way of dealing with the heat? I know aluminum is actually really good in this regard, as it doesn't conduct heat like some other metals do. Anyway, please give me some advice on this.
2) It occurred to me that if he could remove the need for combustion from the engine entirely, that would solve the problem of burning the pilot. Is there any way to envision a fantasy turbo engine that would not rely on burning fuel?
3) Alternately, is there a realistic way to cool the engine that doesn't require so much space? What would that cooling system look like?
