From: skunk-works-digest-owner@mail.orst.edu To: skunk-works-digest@mail.orst.edu Subject: Skunk Works Digest V5 #84 Reply-To: skunk-works-digest@mail.orst.edu Errors-To: skunk-works-digest-owner@mail.orst.edu Precedence: bulk Skunk Works Digest Thursday, 12 May 1994 Volume 05 : Number 084 In this issue: RE: your mail seeking M-12/D-21 books also Re: D-21 at Dover AFB See the end of the digest for information on subscribing to the skunk-works or skunk-works-digest mailing lists and on how to retrieve back issues. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: beede@SCTC.COM (Mike Beede) Date: Wed, 11 May 94 09:58:27 CDT Subject: RE: your mail > MAD is a passive concept and it works pretty well. I would > imagine the same technology used to detect submarines magnetic > anomalies could be transposed and used in the air as well. I think the difference is that a submarine is 10,000+ tons of steel and an airplane is 100- tons of aluminum, titanium, boron fiber, and very little steel (read magnetic material). Also, the detection ranges for MAD are on the order of a mile or less, aren't they? Range for aircraft detection would have to be on the order of 100 miles. So, the detectors need to be on the order of 100*100^2*K = 1,000,000K times more sensitive, where K is a constant representing the relative amount of magnetic material in a sub vs. a plane (probably about 20). Mike ------------------------------ From: clark@acs.bu.edu (Jeff Clark) Date: Wed, 11 May 94 14:42:35 -0400 Subject: seeking M-12/D-21 books also I bought an Italeri 1/72 SR-71 kit on sale a few weeks ago, and to my surprise it includes decals for "940", an M-12 with D-21 drone. (I think that serial is really 61-940 or so; I forget). I thought I'd build it into this. Now, I know an SR-71 isn't the same as a A-12/M-12, so I have to modify it some. What I'm after is, like someone just asked, a decent (relatively cheap, and available) reference with good pictures of this aircraft. The decals seem to be lacking a bit, and the only book I have, "SR-71 in action", doesn't give me any more inforamtion than the two pictures in the Skunk archives. What can you recommend? Thanks, Jeff ------------------------------ From: larry@ichips.intel.com Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 14:43:37 -0700 Subject: Re: D-21 at Dover AFB Ran writes: > On our way >out of the base, I looked at the antique aircraft lineup and spotted an >airframe that had been tucked in a far-off corner during the show, yet was >right near the fence for the departing crowd. The slim, black shape could >only be one thing, and I hopped out of the car and over a divider to see a >D-21 casually spotted next to a Jenny and a Texan. That's quite a setting! Jenny, T-6, and a D-21!! > Enough photographs of it >are available that you don't need me to describe it to you, but I must say >that it was smaller than I was expecting. To me, when I worked on the restoration of SMOF's D-21, it looked BIG. Because of it's endurance, the D is mostly fuel tank. It was the longest ramjet that Marquardt had ever worked on. Off the top of my head I would expect it to be longer than both the T-6 and the Jenny. Was it? > Slick with rain, it looked as >sleek and as exotic as any Skunk Works bird I've ever seen, Boy, that's the truth! There is a certain angle in SMOF's exhibit that I could look at all day. Looking up on the shape of the D from the side of the M between the wing leading edge and the LCO's cockpit - the D looks like a supersonic bat! >The placard under the dolley on which it rested said that it was an AF Musuem >piece, in the process of being transferred to NASM. It looked in wonderful >shape, and it bore no identifying marks that I could see. I looked all over, >but it was totally devoid of any serial numbers or lettering. They must have sprayed it black right over the stencils etc. When we did SMOF's D, I got a chance to work on it right after it arrived from Davis Monthan. There are stencils all over it because there are a number of access panels around it. We photographed and positioned on a drawing, all the stencil verbage before sanding and repainting SMOF's D. The stencils were then reapplied on the painted airplane. It looks squite striking! The black with the white stencils. Looks like it just rolled out of the skunk works! Did the bird you see have an engine? From the side, you can tell if you look at the tail and see a silverish ring protruding from the back about an inch or so. From the back you can tell by just looking in the tail looking for what looks like the inside of a nozzle and upstream of that you can see what looks like an afterburner on a traditional jet (actually, essentially, that's what it is - but it's the ramjet combustor - you can see the rings of V-gutter shaped flame stabilizers). Upstream of that slightly (if I recall) is the igniter in the center with the fuel ejectors around it (flower petal like shapes) and upstream of that is a honeycomb shaped flow control screen that takes the flow and makes it nice and straight before heat addition - if I recall correctly. Neat engine! >I am curious - what sort of performance figures are known and/or speculated >about this thing? Well. The experts say Mach 3.2 to 3.8. Actually there was a fuel control that was adjusted on the ground for the speed. Now, I had heard from one of these guys that the fuel control could be set for Mach 4.5. But since then that same person has retracted that. I don't believe the D's flew at Mach 4+. I've seen the maintenance handbook (very informal) for the D's RJ-43 engine with the performance curves and everything (hand done). No Mach 4. There have been photos (see Miller's 50th Anniv. Skunk Works book) of a longer inlet spike on the D-21 model which you would need to position the spike shock on the inlet lip at a higher speed, but no photos of actual D-21A/B's ever show the longer spike fitted. Also, Marquardt ramjets of that period were doing Mach 4+ on the Lockheed X-7 PTV. But, the D's engine was basically a BOMARC engine (they were not interchangeable however). I believe the Mach 3.2 - Mach 3.8 speed range for the D. > The sign stated Mach 4+ performance which surprised me; I >thought the AF would be more vague. No. these things are in museums now. The ramjet engines themselves, seperately, are also going to be on display eventually as well, and as I said it's known that airbreathers were doing Mach 4 in the late 50's. So no new disclosures there. > How many D-21/M-12 flights were made, The sole surviving Lockheed LCO says 4. There were 2 USAF LCO's in training. >and how many B-52 drops? That number or possibly enough info to calculate it, is in the Skunk Works 50th Anniv. Book. That chapter is taken from Kelly's D-21 notebook, so it will definitely give you an accurate feel for what it was like to operate the B model. It definitely leaves you with the opinion that at the time, it was an idea that was a little ahead of itself, just a little. :) >Any pointers to D-21 reference works would be appreciated. I have already >reread my Aerograph that covers it, and I would like to know more, if >possible. Get the new stuff. I would get Miller's Skunk Works 50th Anniv Book. There is also nice D-21 footage in the "Kelly's Way" video being sold by Lockheed LERC. I have also seen some wonderful additional footage, during a D-21 party, but that footage is not available yet. It's the type of thing that eventually finds its way to WINGS on DISCOVERY Channel, I would imagine. >Cheers (and sorry for the long post), Sorry for the long answer. Larry ------------------------------ End of Skunk Works Digest V5 #84 ******************************** To subscribe to skunk-works-digest, send the command: subscribe skunk-works-digest in the body of a message to "majordomo@mail.orst.edu". If you want to subscribe something other than the account the mail is coming from, such as a local redistribution list, then append that address to the "subscribe" command; for example, to subscribe "local-skunk-works": subscribe skunk-works-digest local-skunk-works@your.domain.net To unsubscribe, send mail to the same address, with the command: unsubscribe skunk-works-digest in the body. 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