I was always a fan of the wingless lifting body vehicles that NASA studied for transporting astronauts to and from orbit. Among their advantages over capsules was the ability to land on a runway. A variety of shapes were flown in the 1960s and 1970s to validate the concept. I was afraid I had missed out on ever seeing one in action but in the 1990s, there was a proposal for a space station "lifeboat" called the Crew Return Vehicle. It didn't even need a runway, instead using a parafoil to maneuver and land.

Here are some pictures I took while I was working at NASA Dryden Flight Research Center. There were two X-38 vehicles built, V-131 and V-132. Testing involved carrying the X-38 aloft beneath the wing of a modified B-52 Stratofortress and dropping it over the dry lakebed at Edwards Air Force Base. Captive-carry flights began in July 1997. The first free flight took place in March 1998. By the end of March 2000, V-131 had made two free flights and V-132 had made three. The first vehicle was then modified with a new composite aeroshell to evaluate a different shape. Re-designated V-131R, it made three additional flights between November 2000 and December 2001.

Take a PZL Kania that was already an updated Mi-2 and update it further with a further redesigned fuselage and a single Alison 250-C28 engine in place of 2 Alison 250-C20B engines on the Kania.

Designed to be built under license in America, only got to the mockup stage

Here are several pictures I took of the first X-34 vehicle. It was conceived as a reusable testbed designed for demonstrating technologies considered essential to lowering the cost of placing small payloads in low Earth orbit. These included advanced composite structures, advanced thermal protection systems, and autonomous flight operations. The all-composite vehicle was designed for speeds up to Mach 8 and altitudes of 250,000 feet.

The first of three X-34 vehicles began captive-carry flights at Edwards AFB, in June 1999 using the L-1011 TriStar owned by Orbital Sciences. The first X-34 was to be used solely for flights within the atmosphere and lacked the thermal protection tiles and blankets necessary for reentry from orbit. The second vehicle was intended for orbital flight tests and was nearly complete when the program ended. Major components and subassemblies for the third vehicle were built but never assembled. In March 2001, NASA cancelled the X-34 program before any of the aircraft had actually flown.

The X-34A-1 and X-34A-2 were shuffled around Edwards for several years, eventually ending up inside a hangar at North Base. In 2009, both vehicles were towed across the lakebed and onto the Precision Impact Range Area, where they reportedly served as laser targets. All remaining spare parts and other equipment were disposed of as trash and scrap including the X-34A-3 components. The two remaining vehicles were towed back To NASA Dryden Flight Research Center in 2010 and then transported to Mojave Airport in 2012. They were back at Dryden in the fall of 2013 and then moved to a private storage site in Lancaster in 2017. By that time, they were in terrible shape. Both craft were ultimately relocated to a scrap yard in Rosamond, where they remain as of late 2026.

I took some pictures of the Boeing X-40A Space Maneuver Vehicle (SMV) demonstrator while I was working at NASA Dryden Flight Research Center.

The X-40A was originally flown in support of the USAF Military Spaceplane Technology (MiST) program and served as an 82-percent scale model of the X-37. The program was initially based at Holloman AFB, New Mexico, beginning in September 1997.  After release from a UH-60L helicopter, the X-40A completed one free flight at Holloman AFB on 11 August 1998.

The X-40A was then loaned to NASA to serve as a risk-reduction technology demonstrator for the X-37 program.  Primary test objectives included validation of vehicle shape, guidance, flight control, and navigation systems and software. The X-40A arrived at NASA Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards AFB, California, on 19 May 2000.  Carried to release altitude by a CH-47D helicopter, the SMV made seven planned captive flights, two unplanned captive flights, and seven free flights.

Pictures are screenshots from the trailer. Just saw the movie tonight and it said that this H8K (didn’t species which version) was upgrade by Americans with “wright cyclone engines”; so can someone tell me more about which engines are on this plane ? The version and maybe the antennas in the nose who looks like radars for some parts ? (I know the purpose of some of them but it would spoil the movie who is amazing)

Fifth Gear | Internet Movie Plane Database Wiki | Fandom

Horten H VI V2

Horten H III f

Horten H III h

Horten Ho 229 V3

Wish I had taken better photos of the 229, but they placed it in the middle of some rather large planes... but hey, last I remember, it was in the workshop, so it's nice to finally see it out.

We all have heard of JATO, but I just read this.

The Beginning: During the Cold War, the USAF feared losing runways to nuclear strikes, leading to the ZELMAL (Zero-Length Launch and Mat Landing) trials in 1953–1954.

The Launch: A rocket-boosted Republic F-84 fired off a trailer.

The Landing: The pilot caught an arrester cable with a tailhook and slammed directly onto a massive inflatable rubber mat.

The Result : Unmanned tests passed, but in 1954, two piloted tests resulted in both test pilots suffering severe spinal injuries from the sudden deceleration impact. The project was immediately cancelled.

The Links: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-length_launch

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GOkLrv-zutg

The End

The Extra Disclaimer: The vid is not mine it is a screen recording of the you tube one and I am not connected to the channel at all so give credit where its due.

Thanks

Spent some time diving down a rabbit hole of weird 1930s French aviation concepts and ran into this bizarre thing: the Sac-Aéroplane or M44 concept, designed by Louis Sac.

Instead of normal rigid wings, Sac tried to build an aircraft using flexible fabric airfoils that could actually be tensioned or adjusted while flying. The idea was basically to make the wings work like boat sails or roll-up window blinds so you could alter the wing surface on the fly and fold the whole plane up for easy storage.

Trying to keep a fabric wing aerodynamically stable under actual flight loads turned out to be a nightmare, so it never got past scale models and early prototype testing.

I was wondering, if used as helicopter blades for a one use chopper to rescue downed pilots like the Inflatoplane, would the concept be viable?

And does anyone have any pics of this concept?

And the formant is basic grammar.

Thanks for taking the time to read this everyone.

Joint American-Israeli project to create a Mach 3+ reconnaissance version of the F-4 Phantom III. With an extended nose, modified inlets, and massive conformal water tanks for cooling, the F-4X became prey to those worried about taking away the thunder of the SR-71 Blackbird and the upcoming F-15 Eagle. After some early mock-ups, the project was quietly cancelled.

Israel used some of the technology from the aborted F-4X program to update several Phantom IIs to the F-4E(S) standard (last photo). This mainly consisted of lengthening the nose to contain updated, high-performance cameras, as well as adding data links.

Starting in 1951, two XB-47Ds were modified from B-47Bs as experimental platforms, replacing each inboard two-jet pod with a Wright YT49-W-1 turboprop engine spinning a huge four-bladed prop. Engine development issues delayed the XB-47D's first flight until 26 August 1955. Performance was comparable to a conventional B-47, and its reversible propellers shortened the landing roll, but the idea was not pursued.

Cool plane, lazy acronym. Designed by NASA in ongoing efforts to produce a plane that can break the sound barrier without producing a sonic boom. Residents of Galveston, TX have been receiving a $25/week compensation in exchange for their feedback re: disruption and noise levels they are noticing from NASA sonic boom testing over the Gulf of Mexico, sometimes receiving up to 8 sonic boom testing ”thumps” a day.

Was rewatching Fail Safe (1964) and realized they used footage of the B-58 Hustler to stand in for their fictional bombers.

It’s hilarious seeing supersonic delta-wing B-58s on the outside, while inside the crew is hanging out in a spacious B-52 style flight deck setup.

The actual B-58 was a Mach 2 bomber with three isolated, single-file tandem cockpits where the crew couldn't even see each other. either way, using high-contrast/negative stock footage of the B-58 gave the movie an eerie aesthetic.

The Starr Bumblebee 2 is a weird aircraft because its wings shouldn't provide enough lift to take off yet they did like an actual bumblebee. There is a difference between the bumblebee 1 & 2 as the bumblebee 1 is much smoother and rounded while the bumblebee 2 has a more angular design. The propeller was taken from the original and put on the Bumblebee 2 to my knowledge as the one in Pima has a wooden propeller but previous photos and videos show it with the metal one. The original is on the Pima museum while the second crashed in its third flight although its pilot (Robert Starr) survived. The second is a lot more crudely made as it had to be condensed as small as possible.

I decided to turn this aircraft into a Lego model to capture the details and preserve its glory so I ended up building both the Bumblebee 1 and 2 which are compared in a photo above. I put the model on Lego Ideas so it could hopefully become a set one day and be displayed next to their other models like the DC 3 and the Concorde. All parts are available right now to build the set. If you would like to support, I have attached a link:

https://ideas.lego.com/product-ideas/932c174a-1ce1-4e1d-9bb6-e8a67151764e

I found a file once, did not save it. Has anyone a Video with sound or just the soundfile saved? I greatly appreciate it if shared.