US Lifting Bodies Studies - START (ASSET/PRIME), FDL, X-24, etc.

[Archibald]

@Stargazer has tracked down two documents (from the broken links). God bless his soul.

 

[SpaceMonk]

Hi,

The McDonnell Douglas Model-176 was hypersonic spacecraft,but when
I search about it I found a Models of hypersonic aircraft not known,
see the picture,

 

[Barrington Bond]

Seems to remind of just before the millennium...

 

[publiusr]

Seems to remind of just before the millennium...

I take it the rest of the Super-Swift crashed?

 

[Dew]

@Stargazer has tracked down two documents (from the broken links). God bless his soul.

Another one for the X-24C pile I'd saved back then the links worked

 

[Dew]

Late '60's FDL-9 glider from Airbreathing Hypersonic Propulsion

 

[hesham]

From Boeing magazine 1964

 

[alpha_k]

finally, someone find where BGRV hidding in
USAF museum, he said the noisetip of this collection is made by depleted uranium(or depleted uranium inside the noisetip as ballast?) thus the museum deside not to display it. by the way,the last aircraft has been damaged,sad.maybe the staff didn't know how to dismantle it.

so the question is : why they use DU?

 

[GTX]

so the question is : why they use DU?

Presumably because of its density

 

[Dew]

Composited from PDF of AFFDL-TR-70-42 Analytical Investigation of a Low Cost Expendable Tankage System for an Advanced Staging Vehicle Concept:

 

[Dew]

Composited images from:
Preliminary Design Study for a Hi-Hicat Vehicle and Instrumentation System.

 

[hesham]

What was in its nose ?,

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/aa/0d/20/aa0d2034d4702f9bcd483fbf0f1fc887.jpg

 

[blackstar]

What was in its nose ?,

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/aa/0d/20/aa0d2034d4702f9bcd483fbf0f1fc887.jpg

 

[Byeman]

What was in its nose ?,

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/aa/0d/20/aa0d2034d4702f9bcd483fbf0f1fc887.jpg

air data probe

 

[Dew]

FDL-7-esque windtunnel model from AEDC Facebook page:

Did you know… In July 1969, more than 500 hours of testing were conducted on models of a proposed maneuverable-recoverable reentry spacecraft in wind tunnels at Arnold Air Force Base.
The unmanned space vehicle was designed to reenter the atmosphere at very high speeds and make a conventional “aircraft-type” landing.
The objective of the tests was to obtain force, moment and heat transfer data on model configurations under simulated reentry flight conditions.​

 

[okakac]

Here is the World's Fair Exhibit picture from Dyna-Soar: Hypersonic Strategic Weapons System. Additionally, I'm posting a copy of the Robert McCall painting to illustrate my above comment.

Don't have an idea of its utility to the forum when l post this but here is a larger version of the McCall painting from tumblr.

 

[martinbayer]

Don't have an idea of its utility to the forum when l post this but here is a larger version of the McCall painting from tumblr.

View attachment 739912

Gotta love those crab hands! When all you have is a pair of scissors, everything looks like a piece of paper... Also, going in on that poor antenna with full gusto with the backpack pushing for full efficiency! But then again, his buddy is giving the lifting body RCS a good workout as well...

 

[Archibald]

Composited from PDF of AFFDL-TR-70-42 Analytical Investigation of a Low Cost Expendable Tankage System for an Advanced Staging Vehicle Concept:

View attachment 729048

Also called: Lockheed Starclipper.

 

[Dronescapes]

Aviation Oddities And Amazing Aircraft. The X-Planes Series: Heavenly Bodies (X-24A, X-24B, X-30)

 

[flateric]

...

 

[Dynoman]

Possibly subscale MURP flying model from NASA Armstrong (Dryden FRC) history.

 

[Dew]

..that time NASA forgot what a MURP was (~from Johnson Space Centre's Aug '84 Space News Roundup):

What's a MURP?​

In the course of preparing a history of the Space Shuttle Orbital Flight Test Program, Rice University Historians Joe Guilmartin and John Mauer have come across an acronym which so far defiesdecoding. The acronym is MURP, and apparently it refers to a reusable space-craft design considered by the Shuttle task force in the late 1960s.
'We have looked high and low for evidence of what MURP stands fort" Guilmartin said, "but so far we haven't found it." The historians ask anyone with knowledge or documentation of the acronym to please contact them at x2838.​

 

[Dynoman]

MURP - Manned Upper-stage Reusable Payload. The crewed vehicle to the SERV (Single-stage Earth-Orbital Reusable Vehicle), developed by the Chrysler Space Division.

 

[flateric]

https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/serv-1971-vtovl-alternate-shuttle-proposal.6408/post-351926

 

[Dynoman]

Hyper III Hyper Glider on display at Castle Aviation Museum

 

[Dew]

from LaRC image library:

 

[Dew]

..and these of course:

 

[NavarchNicias]

..and these of course:

"Research staff", including one R. Dale Reed (rear left, wearing tie), father of the Lifting Body concept at NASA and initiator of just about every US Lifting Body study (for which this thread is named) of the era.

Sometimes we run out of things for the summer interns to do and let them write captions.

 

[Dew]

from "Operational and Research Aspects of a Radio-Controlled Model Flight Test Program"

a subscale model of a classified, advanced hypersonic cnnfiguration with an unusually low subsonic L/D ratio (Fig. 1).

 

[Dynoman]

from "Operational and Research Aspects of a Radio-Controlled Model Flight Test Program"

The way the wing is shaped with a curved trailing edge and with the location of the outboard vertical stabilizer, I'm curious if the wings were hinged and rotated outward for lift, possibly implying that the design was to be launched from a rocket, and then over a target, slowed to subsonic speeds and maneuvered to the target.

 

[quellish]

from "Operational and Research Aspects of a Radio-Controlled Model Flight Test Program"

View attachment 752347

This is actually based on SWERVE. I (think) this was Avocet II.
Avocet and Avocet II added wings to SWERVE to test low speed handling qualities and control.