Aerospace Projects Review Blog – Page 25 – Unbuilt aircraft and Spacecraft Projects

S-IC stage recovery

launch vehicles, rockets, spacecraft No Responses »

Apr 202021

Another Boeing concept for the recovery of an S-IC stage. This used large fins with deployable drag brakes to stabilize the stage nose-down, parachutes to slow descent and sizable rocket motors for terminal braking just before splashdown. Additional rockets arrest the stages “collapse” to the side.

Would a Falcon 9-style landing have been better? Sure. But that wasn’t going to happen with 1960’s technology. A splashdown, recovery and refurbishment would have been expensive, but likely not as expensive as a brand new stage, and as has been the case with Falcon 9, as time goes by and experience grows, everything would get better and cheaper.

Future wing structures could be pretty strange

future projects, jetliner No Responses »

Apr 152021

… but manufacturing them will be a challenge. Modern computerized design processes can produce wings with rather organic internal structures that would be meaningfully lighter while being just as strong, but they could not be manufactured today. But one day it will likely become possible to 3D print large sections of wings directly out of, say, titanium or carbon fiber with the fibers built-in, oriented correctly. And then the structures aeronautical engineers have used for more than a century of ribs and spars will be replaced with something that looks like the interior of a birds bones.

PDF Review: Ring Airfoil Grenade

PDF Review No Responses »

Apr 132021

An interesting presentation on the “Ring Airfoil Grenade” concept from some decades ago. This was a “fat” ring-wing that would spin in flight; the result was a flatter trajectory than you’d get with a traditional bullet-shaped grenade. The presentation includes a large number of diagrams and photos of various types of grenades and launchers. Some were made from steel, pre-scored and filled with high explosives; others were made of softer materials and filled with CS capsules. Upon impact, the high spin rate would cause the projectile to split open and spew out the tear gas; and all that would be left is a rubber ring of no particular tactical value to the rioters. The M234 RAG launcher was actually used in the late 70’s into the 80’s, though it seems pretty much forgotten now.

The aerodynamics of the RAG seem interesting. Difficult to envision what the technology could be used for apart from various types of grenades, though. The “cookie cutter” armor piercing system certainly seems interesting.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/275521155_IFO’s_Identified_Flying_Objects_-_Ring_Airfoil_Grenade_RAG

Sukhoi/Gulfstream supersonic business jet

jetliner, transports No Responses »

Apr 132021

A while beck someone sold a brochure about the Sukhoi-Gulfstrem supersonic business jet, the S-21. This concept, dating from the early 90’s, was a failed attempt to build a corporate-jet sized SST. While Gulfstream eventually dropped out, Sukhoi kept going until around 2012. The design changed substantially as time went by, but the realities of the economics of supersonic small aircraft around the turn of the century doomed the idea.

B-60 photos

bomber No Responses »

Apr 062021

The B-60 was Convairs failed effort to compete against the Boeing B-52. It began as a modification of the B-36; the wings were snapped off and swept back, the piston engines were removed and replaced with four turboprops and was originally dubbed the B-36G. When the turboprops were replaced with eight dual-podded turbojets, it was designated the B-60. Compared to the B-52 it was woefully obsolete, with World War II aerodynamics married to Korean War engines; it was incredibly fat and draggy and could not hope to compete with the advanced B-52. Still: it’s a B-36 with jet engines.

A while back someone on eBay sold a few vintage photos. I thought they might be of interest.

Trident vs Trident

nukes, rockets, US Launcher Projects No Responses »

Apr 042021

The Trident I and Trident II were fundamentally different missiles, despite the name.

Somewhere around here I have a technical paper on turning the Trident II into a satellite launcher. Been meaning to work that into an issue of US Launch Vehicle Projects one of these years.

March 2021 rewards

bomber, hi-rez, hypersonic, jetliner, launch vehicles, Monthly Historical Documents Program, Patreon, Recon, rockets, space shuttle, spacecraft, spaceplane, transports, VTOL No Responses »

Mar 312021

Just released, the March 2021 rewards for APR Patrons and Subscribers. Included this month:

Diagram/art: a large format scan of an artists concept of the XC-14. This was printed with a large number of signatures; they seem to be Boeing engineers.

Document 1: “Project Hummingbird.” An FAA document summarizing the characteristics of STOL and VTOL aircraft circa 1961, including bogh built and proposed types. This was scanned from a clean original!

Document 2: “The Thor Missile Story.” Old, old, incredibly old school media… a film strip propaganda piece about the statues of the Thor IRBM.

CAD diagram: the WWII era German DFS 228 rocket powered high altitude recon plane, proposed operational version.

If this sort of thing is of interest, sign up either for the APR Patreon or the APR Monthly Historical Documents Program.

Because I forgot to mention the January and February rewards… subscribers/patrons got these (new subscribers can order them as back issues):

January 2021: Titan IIIC/IIIM booster rockets; CAD diagram of Post-Saturn concepts; a Convair Heavy Bombardment Airplane brochure; a fractional XF-103 mockup review and technical description; a fractional Westland paper on VTOL; a General Dynamics report on a proposed turboprop transport for Saturn stages.

February, 2021: An Aerion SST brochure; a Lockheed SST diagram; Dornbergers report on a commercial rocket powered airliner (scanned from a clean vintage copy); an early Convair jet flying boat bomber brochure; a CAD diagram comparing General Atomics’ ten-meter Orions for the USAF and NASA.

Can anyone shed any light on this “tanker airplane?”

hi-rez, transports No Responses »

Mar 302021

From the National Archives, a few photos dated 1979 of a Lewis Research Center model of a “Tanker Airplane.” *FAR* higher resolution versions of the photos are available at the links.

TANKER AIRPLANE MODEL

And…

TANKER AIRPLANE MODEL

That’s certainly an unusual configuration. If it hadn’t originated at NASA, I’d think it was a college students design project. But then… there’s one more photo which might shed a little bit of light onto the subject:

TANKER AIRPLANE MODEL

Huh.

The text on the wing reads:

To
LRC from LeRC
November 8(?) 1979

This would seem to be some sort of a gag gift from Lewis Research Center to Langley Research Center, but the details of what, who, and why are not available to me. If anyone can shed light, please do so.

Protected: March 2021 Rewards Catalogs

Monthly Historical Documents Program, Patreon, Patreon catalog Enter your password to view comments.

Mar 282021

Lockheed NATF

fighter, hi-rez, Monthly Historical Documents Program, Patreon, stealth No Responses »

Mar 262021

In the long, long ago, Lockheed tried to sell the F-22 to the US Navy. In order to accommodate the needs of Naval aviation, the aircraft would have had to have been massively modified… most obviously by giving the aircraft variable geometry wings like the F-14’s. Clearly the Navy didn’t go for it: the cost of the program would have been immense, as would have been the risks. The F-22 ended up being troubled enough with materials and maintenance nightmares; add to that the rigors of slamming into carrier decks, constant humidity and salt air, all the other bothersome details of operating from ships at sea; and add to THAT the fact that while the NATF (Naval Advanced Tactical Fighter)*looked* like the F-22, it would have shared very few structures in common with its Air Force cousin and would have been basically a new aircraft… it would undoubtedly have been massively expensive to a degree that even the F-35 would have been hard pressed to match.

The fullrez scan of the artwork has been made available at 300 DPI to all $4/month patrons/subscribers in the 2021-03 APR Extras folder at Dropbox. If you would like to help fund the acquisition and preservation of such things, along with getting high quality scans for yourself, please consider signing on either for the APR Patreon or the APR Monthly Historical Documents Program.

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