Sneaky Pete

Dec 152012

In 1977, General Dynamics produced the “Sneaky Pete” design for a stealthy fighter or attack aircraft. The design was quite similar to that of the later McDonnell-Douglas A-12 Avenger II, a delta flying wing with underslung inlets and a straight trailing edge. There were notable differences: an additional inlet on the upper surface, the exhaust was on the upper surface and there was a single pilot. It also appears that the Sneaky Pete had vertical stabilizers on the upper surface that would fold flush during cruise. Performance, weights, dimensions are all sadly unavailable. Sneaky Pete was part of the design evolution leading to the ATF (eventually won by Lockheed and became the F-22), though it seems very unlikely that it would have been capable of supersonic flight, much less supercruise.

Stagger Around #3: AGM-129 “Stealth” Advanced Cruise Missile

nukes, stealth No Responses »

Oct 142012

Literally years in the making, I’ve put together two versions of a photo essay of several surviving examples of the AGM-129 Advanced Cruise Missile. Available free for the downloading is Stagger Around #3: AGM-129 Advanced Cruise Missile, Abridged Edition as a 13 page PDF booklet. This contains photos of the AGM-129s on display at Hill Aerospace Museum in Utah, the USAF Museum in Dayton and the Strategic Air & Space Museum in Nebraska, ready to print.

Also available is Stagger Around #3: AGM-129 Advanced Cruise Missile, Full Edition. This 34-page edition includes more photos of these missiles, along with the missile at the San Diego Aerospace Museum restoration facility, a rare General Dynamics display model, official USAF photos of the AGM-129 in test and in service and drawings of the missile, including 1/32 scale layout diagrams. This is available through MagCloud, either as a downloadable PDF ($5.75) or as a professionally printed and bound edition ($11.80).

Don’t forget to check out my other MagCloud publications, including Justo Miranda’s Reichdreams Dossiers, Aerospace Projects Review, Historical Documents, and Photographing Stuff.

And don’t forget to check out Stagger Around #1, F-104A Starfighter, and Stagger Around #2, Starship Enterprise.

1970’s Teledyne Ryan Stealthy RPV

bomber, research, stealth 2 Responses »

Oct 132012

A 1974 design by Teledyne Ryan for a stealthy remotely piloted vehicle While the general shape is certainly well within the norm for stealthy craft, the structure itself is quite different: it is basically a metal vehicle optimized for stealth, wrapped in a radar-transparent plastic skin optimized for aerodynamics. The only aspect of it that really seems to fail modern stealthy practices is the apparent straight shot in to the turbine face. From the Jay Miller collection.

The technology behind this was patented by Teledyne Ryan:

Aircraft of low observability

CORRECTION: This was originally posted as a TRW design, when in fact it was a Teledyne Ryan design. D’oh.

Boeing stealth hovercraft

ships, stealth No Responses »

Sep 052012

Found in a pile of ebay-obtained glossies – all the ones that could be identified were Boeing – was this one showing an armed and rather large hovercraft plowing over polar seas. No other data… date, identification, etc. all missing, just the image. What’s shown is a hovercraft propelled by six turbofan engines, with a very “Sea Shadow” type of semi-stealthy build, with a bunch of vertical launch tubes and what look rather like US Colonial Marine Corps sentry-guns scattered about the deck. The other artwork in the pile seemed to be from the 1970’s, so it’s a safe bet this design dates from then as well.

F-23A diagram in hi-rez

fighter, hi-rez, stealth 7 Responses »

Apr 212012

This design was featured in the F-23 derivatives article in the recent V3N2 issue of Aerospace Projects Review. This was Northrops plan for an operational follow-on to the YF-23, with some notable geometry changes.

You can download a 2.5 megabyte GIF file of the diagram. The link to the JPG file is HERE. To access it, you will need to enter a username and password. These are available on the first page of the Aerospace Projects Review V3N2 Addendum (available HERE) Note that both are case sensitive.

NATF-23 diagram in hi-rez

bomber, fighter, hi-rez, stealth 10 Responses »

Mar 132012

This design was featured in the F-23 derivatives article in the recent V3N2 issue of Aerospace Projects Review. This was an attempt by Northrop to adapt F-23 design elements to a Naval role, carrier-capable.

You can download a 1.4 megabyte GIF file of the diagram. The link to the JPG file is HERE. To access it, you will need to enter a username and password. These are available on the first page of the Aerospace Projects Review V3N2 Addendum (available HERE) Note that both are case sensitive.

“Christmas Fighter” in High-Rez

fighter, hi-rez, stealth No Responses »

Mar 102012

This design was featured in the F-23 derivatives article in the recent V3N2 issue of Aerospace Projects Review. The unusual geometry was an attempt as radar reflection shaping.

You can download a 15.5 megabyte version of this diagram; the link is HERE. To access it, you will need to enter a username and password. The username: the first word in the body of the text on page 8 of APR issue V3N2. The password: the first word in the body of the text on page 24 of the same issue. Note that both are case sensitive.

Northrop Grumman Subscale Test Vehicle

bomber, future projects, jetliner, stealth, transports 6 Responses »

Mar 012012

NG has recently unveiled their concepts for next generation jetliners under the NASA “Environmentally Responsible Aviation” program. NG is not known for airliners, but rather military vehicles… most famously the B-2 stealth bomber. Not surprisingly, their jetliner concept looks a whole lot like a stealthy flying wing bomber. It seems a reasonable suspicion that their work under NASA contract either makes use of existing military design work… or will form the basis of future military design work.

Since the Northrop Grumman ERA N+2 design is revolutionary (at least in terms of airliner design), they have produced a design of a Subscale Test Vehicle. At 143-foot span, it’s about 60% the size of the passenger version and 55% the size of the cargo carrying final version.

The STV would seem to be sized right for a bomber, while the passenger and cargo carrying version would be rather large… more sized for arsenal aircraft, loaded with a vast number of cruise missiles and the like.

Jan 232012

I keep getting asked the same questions, so I guess I should have a Frequently Asked Questions page for my downloads. Well, here it is.
Q01: How does this work?

A: It’s not an automated system. The way it works is that when you place an order through Paypal, Paypal sends me an email notifying me of the order. I then reply to the email address listed in the order, providing you with the web address where you can find your document, plus the username and password you’ll need in order to access it.

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Q02: “I just ordered a document. It’s been a whole 2 seconds, and I don’t have it yet. Where is it?”

A: I’m asleep/out buying groceries/fighting off hordes of zombies. I’ll respond to your email just as soon as I can.

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Q03: “I just ordered a document. It’s been a whole 24 hours, and I don’t have it yet. Where is it?”

A1: Check your “spam bucket.” Some spam filters see response messages such as you’ll get from me as spam, since there is a web address listed in it.

A2: Are you using the email address attached to the Paypal account? The response email with all your download info will be sent to the Paypal-listed email address. If you are using someone else’s Paypal address, or something like that, then *they* will receive the reply.

A3: On rare occasion, the automated Paypal system that sends me order notifications fails to do so. Thus I don’t know you’ve ordered something. Feel free to send a “where’s my stuff” email to:

A4: Search your inbox. You might have gotten the message, but not noticed or recognized it. The header will be something like “Re: Notification of payment received” or “Re: Payment received from YourEmail@YourEmailDomain.com.”

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Q04: “I ordered a document for downloading, but the username and password aren’t working.”

A: By far the most common reason for this is either you’re typing the password wrong… or if you are using cut-and-paste, you are grabbing a spurious blank space. Try again, making sure to cut *just* the password.

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Q05: “I tried that, but it’s still not letting me in.”

A: The second biggest offender is your web browser. Something or other to do with cookies, or something. If you have another web browser (Netscape, Explorer, Firefox, whatever), try that.

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Q06: “I’ve downloaded a PDF file. What do I need to open it?”

A: Adobe Reader. It’s a free program.

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Q07: “I’ve downloaded a ZIP file. What do I need to open it?”

A: Any modern computer should have come with an unzipping program built in. If not, do a search for “unzip,” and download a program to your liking.

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Q08: “I ordered a drawing set, and can see the files named ‘XYZ halfsize.gif’ and ‘XYZ quartersize.gif,” but not the full size image. Why?”

A: Some of the full size images are quite large. Sometimes they are so large that operating systems and/or image viewing and processing programs simply refuse to show them. All of the full-size images I sell are viewable on *my* system, which is a bit antiquated… but that doesn’t mean that they will be viewable on *all* systems. This is why I include the “halfsize” and “quartersize” versions, so that everybody should be able to see the images. You do still have the full-rez image… try looking at it on another computer.

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Q09: “Ooops, I ordered the wrong thing. I wanted A, but I seem to have actually ordered B. Can I have A?”

A1: If the error is due to something screwy in the webpage – rare, but it has happened that a typo in the HTML coding can lead to this sort of thing – then I’ll fix you right up with a proper download of A. Keep the other item, free of charge.
A2: A slightly more common error is on my part… you order SDOC4, say, and I mistakenly send you the link to SDWG4. In that case, let me know, and I’ll fix you right up with what you actually ordered. Keep the other item, free of charge.

A3: If the error is due to you simply ordering the wrong thing… well… the problem with digital files is that you can easily make copies of them, and thus cannot really be returned. So if my policy was to automatically “correct” “mistakes,” then it’d be the easiest thing in the world to scam me right out of half my catalog.

So… no. If you wanted A but mistakenly ordered B, I’ll be happy to fill your *next* order for A.

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Q10: “I bought one of your documents, and want to extract the images from it for my own devious purposes. However, it’s password protected. Gimme the password. Gimme.”

A: The documents (air docs, space docs and APr’s, but not DCD’s) are password protected *solely* to try to minimise piracy of ’em. The documents will open just fine and will print just fine at high rez, but image and text extraction will present a challenge. I’ve had issues with people taking the data I’ve worked hard to find and prepare and then turning it around and reselling it (grrr). However, if you have a valid use for extracted images, let me know, and I’ll almost certainly fork over the relevant password.

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Q11: “I want you to add me to your mailing list.”

A: No can do. The system I use now requires that the person who wants on the mailing list add themselves (I can add you, or the system will think I’m a spammer). So, simply go HERE and add your email address.

I’ll update this FAQ as questions come in. Feel free to comment

APR issue V3N2 Addendum now available

bomber, fighter, launch vehicles, space shuttle, stealth 5 Responses »

Dec 172011

APR issues used to be published with a mishmash of of 8.5X11 and 11X17 pages. When I started releasing issues on MagCloud, APR became an all-8.5X11 publication.

However, there are oftentimes illustrations that would benefit from being on 11X17, such as many in issue V3N2. Additionally, there are often more illustrations than can be conveniently added to a coherent article. So I have put together an addendum for V3N2, including a number of larger-format illustrations and some new ones that didn’t make it into V3N2. This includes:

1/72 scale CAD drawings from the F-23 derivatives article (they were 1/144 scale in V3N2)
1/96 scale CAD drawings of the FB-23 (formerly 1/144 scale)
Larger-size and additional color renderings of the F-23A and NATF-23 by artist Ken Scott
Larger-size versions of the “Christmas Fighter,” YF-23, F-23A and NATF-23 diagrams
Larger-size and additional diagrams covering the STAR Clipper and derivatives

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The V3N2 Addendum can be downloaded directly from me for the low, low price of $5. To get the download, simply pay for it here through paypal.

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