Northrop TACIT BLUE

Tacit Blue also had to meet a broad radar frequency band no matter where the aircraft was being illuminated since it was for near-front line battlefield surveillance plus had to deal with the infrared, visual, acoustic elements and operating the LPI radar, pretty tall order for that time period. B-2 had to meet the same requirements. Northrop did spend a lot of money to develop their RCS prediction code for any shaped air vehicle which definitely paid off and a lot of pole testing at the range to boot. TSSAM and YF-23 directly benefited from Tacit Blue and I would assume other non-acknowledged programs as well.
 
That’s the first belly pic I’ve seen…a big manned cruise missile ;)
 
Last edited:
martinbayer said:
everything with wings looks better with canards.
Click to expand...
A bit of a tangent to the topic, but right under this monitor atop the stack of books which raise it to a better height is a Matchbox diecast SB82 Pusher Prop, an attractive little sky blue and white T-tail canard looking like something from Piaggio or Beechcraft or Velocity.
 
piko1 said:
You are not far from the truth but in Germany its called ET403 aka the father of the ICE
Click to expand...
Aw man, in the 1980s and 1990s I had one of those in DB paint scheme with red window band in HO scale by Lima; it vanished in a move.
Great looking train. Miss the model to this day. And very much remember it having picked up "Donald Duck" nickname.
 
Does anyone have information on any aircraft or programs that were post Tacit Blue but Pre YF-23 more in line with an F-111 sized aircraft or role?
 
Last edited:
Hansblix said:
Does anyone have information on any aircraft or programs that were post Tacit Blue but Pre YF-23 more in line with an F-111 sized aircraft or role?
Click to expand...
You would have to look at Tony Chong's book but there may have been programs still classified and prohibited from publication during that time frame, the only one I know of would be FB-23 which was in parallel with YF/F-23 and a derivative.
 
USAFM R&D hangar as of 2015
www.facebook.com

National Museum of the U.S. Air Force | Dayton OH

National Museum of the U.S. Air Force, Dayton, Ohio. 361,633 likes · 6,968 talking about this · 325,245 were here. Welcome to the official fan page of the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force.
www.facebook.com www.facebook.com
 

Attachments

  • 111021956_10158435647582230_3507106623585328512_n.jpg
    111021956_10158435647582230_3507106623585328512_n.jpg
    53.7 KB · Views: 81
  • 115806219_10158435647277230_1396726609154419995_n.jpg
    115806219_10158435647277230_1396726609154419995_n.jpg
    63.6 KB · Views: 86
  • 116272758_10158435647722230_3970605295469971500_n.jpg
    116272758_10158435647722230_3970605295469971500_n.jpg
    92.2 KB · Views: 73
All the R&D stuff has moved into the new hangar 4 at the main museum complex. Which is partly unfortunate - in the R&D hangar, there were no barriers or anything. One could crawl around under the aircraft and take pictures of weirdo antennas and markings.
 
From what I understood, a production Tacit Blue would have been much more blended, I bet it would have been a pretty cool looking machine. When I started at Pico in 1986, I was supposed to get cleared to a revived program but then funding was pulled, could have been a continuation of TB for maybe other missions?
 
Hydroman said:
From what I understood, a production Tacit Blue would have been much more blended, I bet it would have been a pretty cool looking machine. When I started at Pico in 1986, I was supposed to get cleared to a revived program but then funding was pulled, could have been a continuation of TB for maybe other missions?
Click to expand...

Timeframe would fit for QUARTZ, which Northrop could have been brought back into at that point. To the best of my knowledge QUARTZ round 1 was Ventura though.

It also could have been TACIT BLUE itself, if they wanted to continue using it for ATB risk reduction.

QUARTZ was a reason that DoD was not interested in a production TACIT BLUE.
 
quellish said:
To the best of my knowledge QUARTZ round 1 was Ventura though.
Click to expand...
Just to make sure I understand you precisely, you are saying: "To the best of my knowledge, Northrop's submission for QUARTZ round 1 was developed and submitted by the company's Ventura Division."
 
aim9xray said:
Just to make sure I understand you precisely, you are saying: "To the best of my knowledge, Northrop's submission for QUARTZ round 1 was developed and submitted by the company's Ventura Division."
Click to expand...

Correct, under Kresa if I recall correctly.
"Round 2" was the 1986-1988 time frame, when the future of QUARTZ was in doubt because of design flaws in the chosen design for Round 1. In round 2 Lockheed and Boeing's relationships were changed drastically around a redesign of the aircraft.
It is entirely possible that Northrop submitted a revised/resurrected design of their own for round 2.
 
What do you see as the timeframe for Round One?
 
Do we finally know where these originally came from?
And has a better-quality version ever emerged?

1729760060981.png
 

Similar threads

Please donate to support the forum.

Back
Top Bottom