research – Page 11 – Aerospace Projects Review Blog

Patreon: December rewards

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Dec 262014

There was a delay getting the December rewards out, and a further delay in putting this notification together that the rewards are available… so it might be only a short-ish time before these are gone, replaced by the *January* rewards. So if these look of interest… act fast!

PDF Document: “Design Study for an Air Force Model F-82E Airplane Modified to a Ground Attack Aircraft with Allison XT-38 Turbo Prop Engine,” a North American Aviation report from 1948. This was not for a simple engine swap-out… the cockpits were moved forward and the engines located behind them, driving the props with long shafts.

PDF Document: “SAM-D Air Defense Weapon System,” a 1973 US Army description document of what would become the Patriot missile system.

Large Format Diagram: a large-format full-color (w/bonus grayscale versions) diagram of the X-20 Dyna Soar. Very detailed and clear. Looks great on a wall (believe me on that!)

CAD Diagram: Boeing Model 853-21 “Quiet Bird” a 1961 design study for a low radar cross section (i.e. stealthy) research aircraft.

If you would like to access these items and support the cause of acquiring and sharing these pieces of aerospace history, please visit my Patreon page and consider contributing.

LH2 C-141

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Dec 192014

In the early/mid 1970s the US aerospace industry studied alternate fuels for aircraft. This included liquid hydrogen… a pain to work with, but it makes a great fuel and can be processed easily out of natural gas, less easily out of coal, and with a whole lot of electricity out of water. But it is extremely cold and extremely low density. Thus when Lockheed (apparently half-heartedly) looked at an LH2 version of the C-141, it looked like this:

Under normal conditions, wingtip fuel tanks that vast would snap the wings right off, but LH2 is so light and fluffy that this aircraft would weigh *less* than a fully fueled standard C-141.

X-37B and the Dyna Soar

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Oct 312014

I’ve written a short and illustrated piece on how the Dyna Soar can illustrate the possible capabilities of the X-37B over at War Is Boring:

Wondering What the U.S. Air Force’s Secretive Spaceplane Can Do? History Offers Clues

I am contemplating expanding this considerably for a separate release. It’d be a little different from the usual sort of thing I do, since the X-37B is a real flying vehicle, not just an unbuilt project.

PDF Review: A Method of Reaching Extreme Altitudes

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Oct 312014

This is the fourth of four “PDF Reviews” I plan to have in October, to make up for the lack of any in September. The idea is to present interesting online resources for those interested in the sort of aerospace oddities that you can find in the pages of Aerospace Projects Review. This little project is supported through my Patreon campaign; at current levels, I’ll post two such reviews per month. If you’d like to see more, or just want to contribute to help me along, please consider becoming a patron.

A work of no small importance in the history of spaceflight is “A Method of Reaching Extreme Altitudes” by Robert Goddard. Published in 1919 while his early rocketry work was being funded by the Smithsonian, “Method” is one of the major works of rocket engineering of the 20th century. At this time of writing, Goddard had experimented only with solid rockets; liquid rockets still being in the future. But in “Method” Goddard began to show what rockets could be capable of. In his last section he discussed what would be needed to launch a rocket not just to high altitude, but to escape velocity and beyond, with some discussion of how much flash powder would be needed to be detected impacting (and flashing) on the darkened surface of the moon.

It was that last bit that caused all the trouble.

Goddard was not by nature a publicity hound. And the press of the time, once they got hold of the report, savaged him for what they – incorrectly – saw as a sensational proposal to actually build a moon rocket, coupled with a flawed understanding of physics on the part of some reporters and editorial writers. The resulting firestorm in the press served to popularize Goddards work and inspire rocketeers around the world… but it also inspired Goddard to be even more of a recluse. Had this not been published, or had it escaped the notice of the press, it’s interesting to speculate how history might have been different. Many German rocket scientists might not have been as inspired, while Goddard might have been less reclusive and thus more open to accepting assistance. The result *might* have been that WWII would have ended not with German rocketeers being sought all over the world, but American rockeeters in the same position… but victorious. The result of *that* would have been to potentially move the march to space forward by five to ten years, while denying to the Soviets much of the expertise of the Germans.

The Internet Archive has a scan of a Smithsonian copy of the report. Their copy has a number of hand-written corrections and notations, and appears to be a proof copy rather than one of the final published versions.

Link to the abstract page:

https://archive.org/details/methodreachinge00Godd

And directly to the PDF:

https://archive.org/download/methodreachinge00Godd/methodreachinge00Godd.pdf

PDF Bonus: Docking an XF-85 Goblin

bomber, fighter, Patreon, PDF Review, research No Responses »

Oct 232014

This is the third of four “PDF Reviews” I plan to have in October, to make up for the lack of any in September. The idea is to present interesting online resources for those interested in the sort of aerospace oddities that you can find in the pages of Aerospace Projects Review. This little project is supported through my Patreon campaign; at current levels, I’ll post two such reviews per month. If you’d like to see more, or just want to contribute to help me along, please consider becoming a patron.

One of the odder American aircraft in the immediate post-war period was the McDonnell XP-85 “Goblin.” This was essentially the smallest jet fighter possible to build with the technology of the time… small so that it could be carried within the bomb bay of the Convair B-36. The B-36 could reach far, far beyond the range of any conceivable escort fighter, leaving it at the mercy of defending Soviet fighters; if it could carry a fighter jet with it, it might stand a chance. of course the idea was fairly ridiculous; the Goblin was the biggest plane that could be carried internally, yet would almost certainly stand little chance against a conventional fighter.

Dropping the fighter from the bomb bay would be fairly easy and straightforward. But getting it back was understood to be a challenge. The Goblin would rendezvous with a “trapeze” projected well below the bomb bay, outside of the turbulent airflow around the bombers fuselage. Once docked to the trapeze, it would be mechanically stabilized, the wings would fold up and the trapeze would retract, safely drawing the fighter into the bomb bay. That, at least, was the plan; actual testing with a B-29 showed that the docking rendezvous was far more difficult than envisioned.

This difficulty was not wholly unforeseen. In 1947, the Langley Aeronautical Lab ran a series of wind tunnel tests of a 1/10 scale model of the Goblin and the forward fuselage of a B-36. Tests were conducted with both “power off” and “power on” models; the power off models were well behaved when docked to the trapeze, but the power on models quickly underwent violent flailing. The tests were filmed, with small still images included in the test report; the power-on model response is dramatic, to say the least.

Stability and Control Characteristics of a 1/10-Scale Model of the McDonnell XP-85 Airplane While Attached to the Trapeze

Here’s the link to the NASA-NTRS abstract of the report.

And here’s the DIRECT LINK TO THE PDF.

The wooden model of the FP-85 used. Note the hinged wings and the rudimentary landing gear, used to protect the model if it falls free.

Diagram of the XP-85 model.

Patreon: October 2014 rewards released

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Oct 102014

The October rewards for the APR patrons have been released. They include:

PDF document: “A Recoverable Air Breathing Booster,” A Chrysler study from 1964 for a strap-on booster system for the Saturn Ib incorporating additional H-1 rocket engines and jet engines for recovery.

PDF Document: “XF-103 Descriptive Data,”a Lockheed collection of information on the then-current XF-103. This is from a Lockheed collection of information on competitors designs.

Large format diagram scan: the Boeing Advanced Theater Transport. A later version of the tilt-wing “Super Frog.”

And for the higher-end patrons, a CAD diagram of an early NACA-Langley design for what would become the X-15.

If you would like to access these items and support the cause of acquiring and sharing these pieces of aerospace history, please visit my Patreon page and consider contributing.

Patreon: September 2014 rewards

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Sep 202014

After a bit of a delay, the September rewards have been released. These include a large-format inboard profile of the North American Aviation F-108 Rapier Mach 3+ interceptor:

And “Notes on Space Technology,” a compilation of notes by the Flight Research Division of the NACA Langley Research Center based on a space technology course given in the early part of 1958. A hefty 670+pages in length, this covered just about every aspect of space travel as understood in 1958. While I haven’t read the whole thing, it appears to be not only of historical interest, but also useful to get a pretty good general grasp of space travel science, principles and technologies.

Also included for the higher level patrons are three CAD diagrams:

Boeing Bird of Prey stealth, manufacturing and materials testing prototype aircraft from the 1990’s

Zenith Star experimental space based laser anti-missile system, 1988

Hypersonic Test Vehicle 2, a maneuverable hypersonic glider for missile-launched warheads

The September rewards are about a week and a half late in being released. Since I hope to get the October rewards out a little earlier than normal, that means that the September releases will probably be available for a short time.

If you would like to access these items and support the cause of acquiring and sharing these pieces of aerospace history, please visit my Patreon page and consider contributing.

Almost, but not quite, the final Dyna Soar/Titan III

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Sep 152014

Artwork showing the major Dyna Soar/Titan III contractors. The Titan IIIc show here includes the large pitch stabilization fins (and small yaw fins) attached to the solid rocket boosters. Not depicted are the thrust vector control fluid tanks. At the time, the fins were thought needed to counteract the pitch moment that would be produced by the wings of the spaceplane way up front. In the end, it was concluded that thrust vector control would be more than adequate for the task; and while the Titan IIIC never launched a Dyan Soar, it retained the TVC capabilities that were produced to deal with the Dyna Soar.

Much, much more on the Dyna Soar, including the final few Titan III variants, can be found in Aerospace Projects Review issue V3N4.

SNAP 8 Reactor photo

nukes, research, spacecraft No Responses »

Sep 112014

Spotted on ebay a while back. The writeups suggested that this was the actual SNAP 8 #2 reactor, but it sure looks like a mockup to me. The SNAP-8 reactor could generate a healthy 1 megawatt of thermal energy using 18 pounds of nuclear fuel.

PDF Review: Swept-Wing X-1 “The Effect of Negative Dihedral”

Patreon, PDF Review, research No Responses »

Aug 162014

NOTE: this is the second official “PDF Review.” The idea is to present interesting online resources for those interested in the sort of aerospace oddities that you can find in the pages of Aerospace Projects Review. This little project is supported through my Patreon campaign; at current levels, I’ll post two such reviews per month. If you’d like to see more, or just want to contribute to help me along, please consider becoming a patron.

——————-

In 1948, the Langley Aeronautical Laboratory, Langley Field, VA, put oput a technical paper with the snappy title “The Effect of Negative Dihedral, Tip Droop, and Wing-tip Shape on the Low-speed Aerodynamic Characteristics of a Complete Model Having a 45 Degrees Sweptback Wing.” This described the results of wind tunnel testing of a model of the Bel X-1 supersonic research aircraft with swept wings. At the time, supersonic aerodynamics was in its infancy, and while it was known by this point that swept wings had superior supersonic drag than unswept wings, the details were murky.

Numerous studies were made of re-winged X-1’s, including forward-swept wings. As it happened, no version of the X-1 was ever equipped with anything but unswept wings (though the later versions had substantially thinner wings). Such studies were performed by not only Bell Aircraft but also the NACA; the latter studies may have used the Bell X-1 wind tunnel models, but may not have indicated an intention or desire to actually re-wing an X-1. Instead, the X-1 was a known commodity, and by modifying an existing wind tunnel model, changes in performance could be quickly and inexpensively determined without having to design and build entirely new models.

In this study, several different wingtips were evaluated, including squared-off tips, rounded tips and droops tips.

CONCLUDING REMARKS
The results of low- speed tests made to determine the effects of negative geometric dihedral, tip droop, and tip shape on the aerodynamic characteristics of a complete model having a 45 degree sweptback wing are summarized as follows :

1. The use of -10 degree geometric dihedral resulted in a reduction in the average value of the effective-dihedral parameter C2V through the low and moderate lift- coefficient range that was about 65 percent as great as that usually obtained for unswept wings.

2 . Drooping the wing tips 45 degrees (maintaining the same ground clearance as that with -100 geometric dihedral) resulted in a decrease in the average value of C2V through the low and moderate lift-coefficient range equivalent to about -14 degrees geometric dihedral and also caused an increase in the maximum lift coefficient of 0.15.

3. Changes in the wing- tip plan form indicated that C2V was lowest for the parallel and circular tips and highest for the tips skewed either in or out .

4. By changing a square- cut tip to a faired tip of revolution, the maximum value of C2V for the model with parallel tips was reduced by an amount equivalent to about -4 degrees geometric dihedral.

5. Deflecting the wing tip (from zero) resulted in rolling and yawing moments about the same as that produced by a conventional aileron on a similar sweptback- wing model.

This file was originally added to the NASA Technical Report Server in the mid/late 1990s, and featured rather sad 2-bit (black and white) scanning… fine for text, adequate for line drawings, terrible for art & photos. When I re-accessed it for this review to make sure that it was still available, it had been re-scanned and re-uploaded in full color, provided vastly better image quality.

The abstract can be seen HERE. The PDF file can be downloaded directly HERE.

Three-view of the swept-wing X-1 showing levels of dihedral.

Photo of the wing tunnel model. Note the markings applied to the model. As wing tunnel models are very rarely painted except as needed by the science of the tests, this indicates that this may have been a conventional X-1 wing tunnel model that, after testing, had been painted to turn it into a display model… and then brought back into the shop and re-purposed as a wind tunnel model again.

Drooped wingtips studied.

Different wing planforms & tips examined.

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