Early flight tests of the first General Electric turbojet engine, the Type I-A, clearly showed the need for more powerful engines. GE followed with designs generating increased thrust, including the I-16, designated J31 by the military, which first ran in April 1943. About 250 were built, mainly for variants of the Bell P-59 Airacomet.

GE developed this engine for the US. Navy as a 100-octane, gasoline-burning version of the standard J 31 engine, which normally ran on kerosene fuel. Development began in 1943, when the government believed that future tactical needs would require turbojet engines to use the same fuel as reciprocating engines. Before it was made into a cutaway, this engine, along with a Wright R-1820 piston engine, powered the Ryan FR-l, the Navy’s first partially jet-powered aircraft. Picture taken at the National Air and Space Museum's Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly, Virginia, USA.

Air enters the engine through the series of guide vanes just right of center, painted light blue. The compressor was double-sided, taking in air from inlets on either side. From there the air is compressed and collected in a series of outlets, visible here as the small trapezoidal pipe just above the compressor disk (somewhat darker blue). These pipes bent through 90 degrees and fed the air into the long pipes leading to the rear of the engine (blue). A series of holes allowed the compressed air to flow into the burners (red) towards the front of the engine. After combustion, the flow reversed direction again to flow over the single-stage turbine, located just left of center in the image, and then out through the jet pipe.

Type: turbojet
Thrust/speed: 7,161 N (1,610 lb) at 16,500 rpm
Compressor: single-stage centrifugal flow
Combustor: 10 reverse-flow combustion chambers
Turbine: single-stage axial flow

Manufacturer: General Electric Aircraft Engines, Lynn, Massachusetts, USA