Aerospace Projects Review Blog – Page 72 – Unbuilt aircraft and Spacecraft Projects

S-60 Passenger Pod

Jan 212016

A piece of Sikorsky concept art from 1959 illustrating a commercial passenger pod for the S-60 flying crane helicopter. Into the 1960’s there were a lot of people thinking that commercial helicopter “airliners” would soon be a practical reality… and obviously, helicopters are perfectly functional in the role of hauling people to and fro, but the idea never really caught on. And in retrospect it’s not difficult to see why.

Compared to turbojet or turboprop passenger planes, helicopters are creakingly slow and quite short ranged. So the idea was that helicopter-liners would serve as short range feeder vehicles, transporting businessmen and the like from city centers to outlying regions. A popular goal was to fly passengers from the top of skyscrapers to distant airports, saving considerable time and trouble with ground traffic. But in the end, while helicopters could do that – as many a multi-millionaire with his own helicopter can attest – the cost was always high, and the noise of regularly scheduled very large choppers was excessive. There was also always the fear of helicopters this big zipping up and down the city streets, and building the infrastructure to support in-city commercial heliports just seemed like too much effort.

Re-engined B-52

bomber, Patreon 1 Response »

Jan 202016

I recently acquired diagrams of a B-52 with six high-bypass turbofans. Sadly, the diagram lacks data on *which* engines those were, and when the design was made. So: does this look familiar?

Could be any of several, I think.

The full diagrams have been posted into the 2016-01 folder on the APR Patron Dropbox site. If interested, this and many, many other high-rez aerospace goodies are available to all APR Patreon patrons at the $4 level and higher. So, check it out…

Lorals F-19

fighter, hi-rez 1 Response »

Jan 132016

A single painting created (by noted illustrator Attila Hejja) in 1981 led to a whole lot of speculation about an “F-19.” Even in the era before the internet allowed BS and rampant unfounded speculation to spread easily around the world, this illustration quickly led to a belief that this was a serious design… probably by Lockheed, and probably to be the F-19. It is indeed a spiffy looking aircraft, but it is much more science fiction than aerospace engineering. It appeared in magazines, books, toys and model kits, modified to greater or lesser degrees.

The painting is usually attributed to Loral, which is rather obvious given that it was prominently used by Loral in the ad below. But it appears that it was created for the Dod and is, in fact, in the public domain.

To download the full-rez version from the Aviation Week archive, click here:

http://archive.aviationweek.com/image/spread/19840123/54/1/zoom

And a reasonable-rez version of the painting is available here:

https://research.archives.gov/id/6343685

NIMF Art

hi-rez, launch vehicles, nukes, Patreon, rockets, spacecraft, VTOL No Responses »

Jan 032016

Somewhere north of 20 years ago I received a package in the mail from Martin-Marietta containing stuff on their then-current NIMF study. NIMF was a mangled acronym for Nuclear Rocket Using Indigenous Martian Fuel; basically a propellant tank, structure, landing gear and a nuclear rocket engine, to be used for landing a payload on Mars and for flying or hopping around. The propellant would be liquid carbon dioxide, easily compressed from the Martian atmosphere; the performance would be, by conventional liquid hydrogen nuclear rocket standards, reasonably awful, but it would be adequate to lurch back into Mars orbit or to do long range hops.

Two main designs seem to have been studied: a conical “ballistic” vehicle that would be a dedicated “hopper,” landing on its tail, and a winded vehicle that would land vertically in a horizontal attitude. This latter design was sent to me in the form of diagrams and five computer renders. The renders – early 1990’s vintage – came as viewgraph transparencies, clearly photographs of a computer monitor. The winged vehicle had simple shock absorbers for landing gear, terminating in dishes rather than wheels meaning that a rolling start or stop was impossible. The available information sadly doesn’t explain how the thing was supposed to land vertically.

The full-rez scans of the viewgraphs have been made available to APR Patrons in the 2016-01 APR Extras Dropbox folder. If you’d like to help out and gain access to this and many other pieces of aerospace history, please check out the APR Patreon.

Saturn vehicles for Apollo

launch vehicles, Patreon, spacecraft No Responses »

Dec 302015

A NASA illustration (probably from 1964-66) showing the Saturn launch vehicles planned for the Apollo program. Note that the Saturn Ib shows the Lunar Module ascent stage, sans descent stage. This could have led to some interesting mission possibilities.

The full-rez scan has been made available to APR Patrons in the 2015-12 APR Extras Dropbox folder. If you’d like to help out and gain access to this and many other pieces of aerospace history, please check out the APR Patreon.

Little Joe/Minuteman

launch vehicles, rockets No Responses »

Dec 252015

A 1965 General Dynamics/Convair concept for using obsolete Minuteman I ICBMs as upper stages atop the Little Joe II. This setup would put 2,000 pounds of payload into a 100 nautical mile orbit.

The birth of aerospace mythology

US Spacecraft Projects 6 Responses »

Dec 212015

OK, so I wrote about the “Have Sting” orbital railgun, and produced some provisional diagrams of it, publishing them in US Space Projects #3. A blog article was written for War Is Boring discussing “Have Sting,” based in no small part on my diagrams. OK, so far so good. But then other blogs start writing about Have Sting, and an error is introduced.

Whenever a blog post links to my blog, a “pingback notification” is sent to my blog dashboard. I’ve just glanced at these, haven’t given them much thought. For the most part they seem to be just parroting the verbiage from the War is Boring piece. But with one change: “Have Sting” has become “Have Sling.” A “T” became an “L.”

Examples:
http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/219718-exploring-the-death-star-space-gun-america-never-built

In September, the Aerospace Project Reviews Blog published some fascinating diagrams depicting “Have Sling,” which aerospace historian Scott Lowther described as “[a] General Electric design for a gigantic orbital railgun.” Have Sling was never built, of course.

http://www.usaspeaks.com/news/exploring-the-death-star-space-gun-america-never-built/

September, the Aerospace Project Reviews Blog published some fascinating diagrams depicting “Have Sling,” which aerospace historian Scott Lowther described as “[a] General …

http://www.usaspeaks.com/news/exploring-the-death-star-space-gun-america-never-built/

http://www.viralnewstrend.com/exploring-the-death-star-space-gun-america-never-built/

And a bunch more, all seemingly the same post over and over.

And if you Google “have sling” and some other terms, some seriously wacky stuff appears, which I’m guessing is the result of some weird auto-translation:

http://www.bbtechnonews.com/index.php/2015/12/19/exploring-the-death-star-space-gun-america-never-built/

In September, the Aerospace Task Reviews Blog site released some remarkable layouts portraying “Have Sling,” which aerospace chronicler Scott Lowther

“Aerospace Task Reviews?”

And:

http://journalfocus.com/2015/12/exploring-the-death-star-space-gun-america-never-built/

Exploring the ‘Fatality Celebrity’ space gun America never built

UNITED STATE protection coordinators did at one time think about constructing a huge Fatality Star-like gun in space as component of the “Celebrity Wars” rocket protection program, as Warisboring’s Steve Weintz advised us this week in the middle of the hullaballoo of the position of The Pressure Awakens.

In September, the Aerospace Job Reviews Blog site released some interesting representations portraying “Have Sling,” which aerospace chronicler Scott Lowther…

… the styles explain a space tool the dimension of the International Space Terminal, each Lowther.

Buh?

So now when people try to research orbital railguns, there’s every chance that they will be presented with the fallacious designation “Have Sling.”

I just did a Google search on “railgun” and “have sling.” It spat back 741 results. “Railgun and “Have Sting” only produced 321 results. The lie traveled around the world while the truth was still putting on its boots.

NACA ramjet fighter

fighter, hi-rez No Responses »

Dec 132015

A photo (dating from the 1950’s sometime) showing Dr. Abe Silverstein and Edward R. Sharp, Director of the NACA Lewis Research Center, Cleveland, Ohio, looking at a model of a ramjet equipped supersonic fighter concept. Unclear if this is a NACA design, but it does resemble something out of Lockheed.

Link to the full-rez HERE.

USLP #3, Large Format USBP 10-12, 13-15 Now Available

bomber, Dyna Soar, hypersonic, launch vehicles, rockets, space shuttle, spacecraft, spaceplane, stealth, US Bomber Projects, US Launcher Projects No Responses »

Dec 072015

USLP 03

Issue 03 of US Launch Vehicle Projects is now available (see HERE for the entire series). Issue #03 includes:

Juno V/Titan/Nomad: A 1958 concept for a space launcher using an ICBM for upper stages
Convair ATE Nova: A 1963 idea for winged airbreathing boosters
B-70/Gemini: Using a bomber as a booster
Phase II VTOHL Orbit-On-Demand: a 1985 concept for a relatively small two stage to orbit spaceplane
NASA Lewis Saturn Ib/Centaur/Kick Stage: a high energy upper stage
NASA MSC 042B/Titan IIIL6: a straight-winged orbiter atop a large Titan derivative
Heavy Lift Titan: A large diameter Titan core with three Shuttle boosters
Escher “Unshackled”: An unconventional idea for a lunar rocket

USLP #03 can be downloaded as a PDF file for only $4.25:

——–

—–

Large format USBP drawings, Issues 10-12

The CAD drawings created for USBP reformatted and rescaled for 11X17 collected in a separate volume. Drawings have in some cases been corrected, improved and added to.

USBP 11X17 10-12 collects the diagrams created for issues 10, 11 and 12, including:

Boeing Model 464-34-3, Republic mach 7, Lockheed CL-1301-1, Convair WS-125A, Boeing 484-415, Martin Model 223-10, Boeing Model 814-1010 Dyna Soar, Martin Model 192-5, Boeing Model 464-40, Boeing Model 701-218, Northrop Nuclear flying wing, North American D118, Martin Model 223-11, North American Model 705-00-04, Bell/Martin 464L, Boeing B-1, Boeing Big Bird BB 6800, Boeing Model464-41, Douglas MX-2091-E, Boeing Model 701-238, Martin Model 223-12, Northrop Nuclear Flying Wing, Rockwell MRCC, Lockheed CL-820-8

USBP11x17-10-12 can be downloaded as a PDF file for only $11:
————–

—-

Large format USBP drawings, Issues 13-15

The CAD drawings created for USBP reformatted and rescaled for 11X17 collected in a separate volume. Drawings have in some cases been corrected, improved and added to.

USBP 11X17 13-15 collects the diagrams created for issues 10, 11 and 12, including:

Ryan Model 162, Boeing Orbital bomb, Northrop Atomic Wing, Consolidated Vultee High Speed Flying Boat, Martin Model 189, Boeing Model 464-046, Curtis F-87C, Boeing Model 701-247, Lockheed WS 464L Dyna Soar, McDonnell WS 464L Dyna Soar, North American WS 464L Dyna Soar, Republic WS 464L Dyna Soar, Convair WS 464L Dyna Soar I, Convair WS 464L Dyna Soar II, Douglas WS 464L Dyna Soar, Northrop N206 WS 464L Dyna Soar, Boeing Model 814-1010 Dyna Soar II, Bell/Martin WS 464L Dyna Soar, Boeing Model 2050E Dyan Soar, Boeing Dyna Soar/ Titan IIIc, Bell D2001 TS-149, Lockheed Harvey; Convair Model 35, Rockwell D661-27, Boeing Model 464-49, Boeing Model 988-123, Boeing Manned Orbital Bomber, Boeing Model 701-251

USBP11x17-13-15 can be downloaded as a PDF file for only $11:
————–

—-

Three-man A-4 (V-2)

hypersonic, Patreon, rockets, transports 6 Responses »

Dec 072015

Here’s something I have some vague recollection of posting before, but couldn’t find after a cursory search: a sketch of the seating arrangement of a 3-man A-4 rocket (might be the A-8 derivative). This is a scan of a photocopy of a photocopy; the original photocopy was found in the files of a researcher at the NASM twenty or so years ago. It’s thought that the sketch was originally made by Werner von Braun during WWII.

Little data is provided; range is given as 500 km. *Presumably* this would have been a winged, landing-gear-equipped derivative of the A-4; replacing the warhead of the V-2 with just three guys seems like a waste of three guys, as well as a not terribly effective weapons system.

The full-rez scan (such as it is) has been made available to APR Patrons in the 2015-12 APR Extras Dropbox folder. If you’d like to help out and gain access to this and many other pieces of aerospace history, please check out the APR Patreon.

Older Entries Newer Entries