An ok-quality inboard view of the slick S-67 from 40+ years ago. This represents an armed, operational vehicle.
Nice, eh?
Mar 172016
Mar 112016
A silent NASA film documenting flight testing of the little-remembered X-100 in 1960. The X-100 was a slick-looking tilt-prop design, a predecessor to the X-19. In this video is certainly looks rather wobbly in the air as the pilot attempts to hover. The craft could certainly have benefited from modern computerized controls.
Mar 052016
I managed to finagle a complete full-color scan of an original copy of Eugen Sanger’s 1944 report, Uber einen Raketenantrieb fur Fernbomber (A Rocket Drive for Long Range Bombers). A “meh” quality B&W PDF of an English-language translation of the report has been available online for a while, but it seems to me that the world needs a proper high-rez version of the original, in color where appropriate.
One of the pages I’ve cleaned up from the new scan shows the statistical damage potential if New York City was regularly targeted by a very large number of bombs. This image, at least a black-and-white English-translated version, several generations removed from the original, is reasonably well-known and commonly reproduced… and as described a few years back, is generally described wrong.
Mar 032016
Artwork depicting the Surveyor lunar probe as of June, 1962. Reasonably close to the final product, but some differences are visible. The subsurface probe I believe was not employed; neither was the SNAP-11 nuclear power source. That was intended to power the lander through the lunar night.
Feb 282016
I’ve put scans of a 1968 Popular Science article on the Lockheed AH-56 Cheyenne attack helicopter and a Boeing-Bell brochure on the JVX tiltrotor (which became the V-22) on the APR Patreon dropbox, in the 2016-02 folder.
The Pop Sci article featured cover art by Robert McCall. Just cuz, I tinkered with the cover art, attempting to scrape off the text and restore it to just the painting. Perhaps not a 100% success, but not too bad. The JVX is not *quite* the final V-22 design; a notable difference is the inclusion of a .50 caliber gatling gun in the nose and a rocket launcher hanging off the side the cockpit.
If interested in getting these, please consider signing up for the APR Patreon. The “Extras” are available to all $4 patrons. Quite a pile of high-rez stuff is available now.
Feb 232016
In the early 1970s, after the collapse of the SST program due to, in part, the rise in energy prices, Boeing, Lockheed, General Dynamics and NASA looked at the possibility of jetliners designed to fly economically right at the edge of the sound barrier. The idea was that there is an unavoidable spike in drag at Mach 1.00, but it would theoretically be possible to fly at, say, Mach 0.98 at relatively low drag. This would make the aircraft about 100 mph faster than conventional jetliners without being much more expensive. In order to pull this off, the jetliners would need to take advantage of every imaginable aerodynamic trick in the book… most obviously, area rule designing resulting in “wasp waisted” fuselages, and almost no straight lines… all curves. The problem is that this makes aircraft heavier and more expensive to build. Thus, no transonic airliners ever got any further than wind tunnel tests.
Below is a piece of Boeing art showing one of their designs for an Advanced Technology Transport. It was a Model 767 design, dash-number unknown.
Feb 232016
One of an extremely large large number of designs put forward for Weapons System 324A, Tactical Fighter X, which eventually became the F-111. This particular design, circa 1962, is the WADD 46 from the Wright Air Development Center and is pretty typical… a twin engine supersonic design with sizable variable-sweep wings.
Two full-rez pages from the WS324A Characteristics Summary have been posted to the 2016-02 APR Extras Dropbox folder for all $4 and up APR Patreon patrons.
Feb 222016
An early 1970’s photo of a “mockup” of the Rockwell B-1 bomber. Rather than building an expensive plywood mockup that accurately recreated the complex curves of the B-1, this one was vastly simpler… a “side view” diagram of the B-1 with a few interior details, with a “shadow” on the floor. If you look carefully, it looks like this photo has been censored… the bays fore and aft of the main landing gear have been blacked out. Presumably these showed the payload of SRAMs and/or cruise missiles. One engine and the wing pivot system are included as actual 3-D items, probably mockups. Note that this is not the final B-1 design as built… the nose contours are a bit off.
Feb 182016
Now available… the first of two new US Aerospace Projects titles.
US Fighter Projects #1
US Fighter Projects #01 is now available (see HERE for the entire series). Issue #01 includes:
- Tremulis “Zero Fighter:” A World War II era two-stage rocket propelled, vertically launched interceptor
- North American Rockwell D-541-4 “Surprise Fighter:” An early stealth fighter concept with flip-out wings
- Republic TFX: An unconventionally-configured variable-sweep design, competed to become the F-111
- Martin Model 302: A large four-engined supersonic interceptor loaded with missiles
- Convair Nuclear Powered Interceptor Configuration II: A single-seat design with a nuclear reactor
- NAF Float-Wing Interceptor: A WWII small flying boat to be carried by small ships
- Martin Pursuit-Type Airplane: An early WWII-era design with a prone pilot
- Boeing Model 1074-0006: A 1980’s design for a hydrogen-fueled hypersonic monster
USFP #01 can be downloaded as a PDF file for only $4:
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US VTOL Projects #1
US VTOL Projects #01 is now available (see HERE for the entire series). Issue #01 includes:
- Ryan Model 162: A three-lift-fan ground attack plane with a minimum wing
- NACA VTOL Bomber: A slim six-engined supersonic concept
- Bell X-14C: A three-engine low cost close support plane
- Lockheed GL-224-2: A small rescue craft that can dock in flight with a C-130
- Bell D270A-900-112: A tilt-rotor that has folding props
- Boeing Model 837-313: A minor design for a fighter like a Harrier with variable-sweep wings
- Hughes Hot Cycle Rotor/Wing Composite Research Aircraft: Use the exhaust from a jet engine to spin up a triangular rotor blade…
- Lockheed CL-1026: A civilian derivative of the AH-56, to carry passengers from city center to city center
USVP #01 can be downloaded as a PDF file for only $4:
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Jan 292016
Also of unfortunate image quality. But I’ve never seen it elsewhere, so here’s a Northrop space station concept shown in 1963. No data on it apart from whatever can be gleaned from the image. it *may* be an artificial gravity station, rotating around the shorter “axle near the middle. Unclear what’s going on at the far end.
