From: skunk-works-digest-owner@mail.orst.edu To: skunk-works-digest@mail.orst.edu Subject: Skunk Works Digest V5 #722 Reply-To: skunk-works-digest@mail.orst.edu Errors-To: skunk-works-digest-owner@mail.orst.edu Precedence: Skunk Works Digest Friday, 1 November 1996 Volume 05 : Number 722 In this issue: Edwards Open House serial numbers Edwards Open House Re: Meteor or Space Plane? Re: Air Force publications online U-2 line opening YF-23 Prototype Re: U-2 Line opening re: YF-23 Prototype Test re: YF-23 Prototype re: YF-23 Prototype re: YF-23 Prototype FI article Small scale tecnology-proving aircraft Another store location. LASRE Re: Meteor or Space Plane? Richard Graham at Blackbird Airpark... Re: LASRE Re: LASRE Test mail testing 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: (Programmer/Analyst) Date: Wed, 23 Oct 96 9:42:47 EDT Subject: Edwards Open House serial numbers To see a list of the Edwards Open House participants serial numbers check out the following web page under the reports option. http://www.runwayrats.com Regards Howard. ------------------------------ From: "Anderson, Rick" Date: Wed, 23 Oct 1996 08:20:00 -0700 Subject: Edwards Open House Just a further little note on Edwards Open House for next year - according to Public Affairs they're working on getting four foreign display teams to participate and they are also pushing very hard to make the arrival of the first F-22 occur that weekend. Definitely worth looking forward to. Rick Anderson ------------------------------ From: larry@ichips.intel.com Date: Wed, 23 Oct 1996 11:57:06 -0700 Subject: Re: Meteor or Space Plane? >It seems that it was *really* a meteor (see the posting below, from >the sci.space.* groups). > >J. Pharabod Hey J. I can't accept Mr. Crary's explanation. I don't accept Joe Leikhim's conclusion either. I find both interesting. Both people cite a conclusion without backing it up with information. >- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - >Date: 22 Oct 1996 02:12:20 GMT >From: Frank Crary >Subject: Was big "Meteor" over SoCal and NM really a Space Plane test?????? > >>In article <3269A1B3.513D@nettally.com>, >>Joe Leikhim wrote: >> ... Mr. Crary writes: >It's a meteor. The time and distance between the New Mexico and >California events exactly matches what you'd expect for a meteor >which hit the atmosphere over New Mexico, was slowed by atmospheric >drag into a nearly circular orbit, and re-entered over California. Back your findings up with an explanation please (a new or related old dynamics simulation would be fine) If this is really an hypothesis of yours then please cite that. I have done a little with planetary entry flight mechanics, but it has been awhile. So, perhaps a little explanation of single atmospheric skip trajectories that also do a complete orbit would be appropriate. Perhaps the object actually skipped several times. >A missile trajectory would not match that time and distance, unless >they were trying to do something pointless to attract attention. >A missile would also be unable to produce the New Mexico event, >which was clearly something in the upper atmosphere, not a rocket >launch. The hypothesis of Mr. Leikhim (although he doesn't clearly state it as one either) is that it was a spaceplane. I assume his hypothesis would be that the hypothetical spaceplane was atmospheric skipping and then reentering the atmosphere as well. A suborbital spaceplane could indeed produce skipping meteor like effects. In fact, a suborbital spaceplane can be intentionally designed to skip across the atmosphere. In some planetary entry flight mechanics books some of the problems are exactly that, in fact, there are problems where one optimizes the shape of the vehicle for atmospheric skipping, although such a spaceplane may only really need to do a skip in an emergency situation, as the heat loads are high, and it is not particularly stealthy, as you observed, but the technique can be used. Now, this is one aspect to the sighting that could help clear things up. What was the apparent size and shape of the fireball observed? If it was very large, it probably wasn't a spaceplane. Another aspect to the sighting that might clear it up are the people who are doing communications bouncing transmissions off of meteor tails. It has been claimed by these people, that they can tell a real meteor tail from non-real meteor plasma tail. > As for a "straight line", that doesn't make sense at >all. If the object had been traveling through the atmosphere in >a straight line, then it would have been seen at all points between >New Mexico and California. It was not. Mr. Leikhim stated initially a "straight line across PT Conception through Kernville". Mr. Crary's argument is weak. There are a lot of implicit assumptions, and just one person midway along the path, that saw the object and decided not to report it, makes the argument suspect. Larry ------------------------------ From: dadams@netcom.com (Dean Adams) Date: Wed, 23 Oct 1996 23:30:45 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Re: Air Force publications online > I'd like to thank Howard German (hgerman@banmail.ml.com), for pointing me > towards http://afpubs.hq.af.mil/elec-products/ > where the Air Force now has a number of forms and manuals available for > downloading. Hmm... I found that site several months ago, but it looked like all the forms were in some kind of proprietary forms program format. > I think the Air Force should be thanked for making these > manuals, such as the security document AFI 31-701, "Program Protection > Planning", available to the public. I happen to know that the Air Force has > more manuals available electronically, such as Air Combat Command manuals or > some from the Air Force Flight Test Center (AFFTC) at Edwards AFB that are > now available only to military or government sites, that should also be made > publicly accessible. I'd certainly like to see 'em! > The documents are mostly in Microsoft Word 6 .DOC format (for Windows or > Macs), but some are in Adobe Acrobat .PDF format. Sounds good. I'll take another look. The stuff I downloaded before was in something called .FRL "PERform" format, which was pretty useless without a copy of that program. ------------------------------ From: "Ori" Date: Thu, 24 Oct 1996 08:58:47 MGT-200 Subject: U-2 line opening I read somewhere that the are reopening the u-2 line. The report said that this is due to British orders and the usaf is going to use the opertunity to replace some that have been lost in accidents. Does anyone know anything about this? Ori Zakin ______________________________________________________________________ Ori Zakin http://www.makash.ac.il/students/2/orihp.htm(temporarily down) oriz@www.makash.ac.il - ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ From: "tagalong@onr.com" Date: Thu, 24 Oct 1996 01:16:27 -0500 Subject: YF-23 Prototype In reading accounts of the Edwards Open House, mention was made of = the YF-23 prototype. On a March 1995 visit to Dryden, a HARV project = engineer told me that the idea had come up to test one of the -23 = airframes to destruction in an analysis of the strengths (and = weaknesses) of composites.=20 I had to cringe at the thought. Does anybody know if this may happen? = I hope the plan is scuttled before one of those cool ships is. ------------------------------ From: John Stone Date: Thu, 24 Oct 1996 08:00:41 -0400 Subject: Re: U-2 Line opening Ori Zakin wrote: >I read somewhere that the are reopening the u-2 line. The report said >that this is due to British orders and the usaf is going to use the >opertunity to replace some that have been lost in accidents. Does >anyone know anything about this? If the British decide that they want U-2s for the ASTOR (Airbourne Standoff Radar) program, then yes Lockheed will reopen the line, but to try and get costs lower, if Lockheed can convince the Air Force to part with the money, for the much needed U-2 (the Air Force even took back the U-2R, they lent NASA), they build some for the USAF also. Of course I'm sure they'll have to overcome pressure from the UAV contingent, to not spend money on the outdated U-2, instead of the new UAVs. But right now it's still up in the air. Let's keep our fingers crossed! Best, John | / ^ \ ___|___ -(.)==<.>==(.)- --------o---((.))---o-------- SR-71 Blackbird U-2 Dragon Lady John Stone jstone@thepoint.net U-2 and SR-71 Web Page:http://www.thepoint.net/~jstone/blackbird.html ------------------------------ From: ahanley@usace.mil Date: Thu, 24 Oct 96 9:00:28  Subject: re: YF-23 Prototype The #1 YF-23 is no longer owned by NASA. It was presented to the Edwards museum on July 30th. I don't know what is happening to #2. Art Hanley To those that wouldst query, "Dost thou speaketh for thine employer?", I say thee, "Nay"! ------------------------------ From: au532@freenet.carleton.ca (Rose Lee Kim) Date: 24 Oct 1996 18:36:31 GMT Subject: Test Is this list now dead, or is no one posting. RK ------------------------------ From: Jeff H Clark Date: Thu, 24 Oct 1996 15:33:51 -0400 (EDT) Subject: re: YF-23 Prototype On Thu, 24 Oct 1996 ahanley@usace.mil wrote: > The #1 YF-23 is no longer owned by NASA. It was presented to the Edwards > museum on July 30th. I don't know what is happening to #2. The other YF-23 is currently at a small new(?) musuem in Hawthorne, CA, called the Western Museum of Flight. In addition to the YF-23 they also have a YF-17, in really nice shape. Their web page (which is all I've ever seen of the place) is: http://www.wmof.com Jeff Clark ------------------------------ From: ahanley@usace.mil Date: Thu, 24 Oct 96 13:42:30  Subject: re: YF-23 Prototype The Western Museum of Flight is a museum that receives a good deal of support from Northtrop. It makes sense that they'd get the other YF-23. Thanks to Jeff for the info. Art Hanley If you asked my employers whether they had anything to do with the above, if it represented their views or if they even knew about it, they'd say, "No", and they'd be telling the truth. ------------------------------ From: Mary Shafer Date: Thu, 24 Oct 1996 18:26:54 -0400 (EDT) Subject: re: YF-23 Prototype It went to the Hawthorne museum over a year ago. Mary Mary Shafer DoD #0362 KotFR shafer@ursa-major.spdcc.com URL http://www.dfrc.nasa.gov/People/Shafer/mary.html Some days it don't come easy/And some days it don't come hard Some days it don't come at all/And these are the days that never end.... On Thu, 24 Oct 1996 ahanley@usace.mil wrote: > The #1 YF-23 is no longer owned by NASA. It was presented to the Edwards > museum on July 30th. I don't know what is happening to #2. > > Art Hanley > > To those that wouldst query, > "Dost thou speaketh for thine > employer?", I say thee, "Nay"! > ------------------------------ From: Kerry Ferrand Date: Sat, 26 Oct 1996 00:59:48 +1300 (NZDT) Subject: FI article I just found an article in "Flight International" 9-15 October that may of interest some list readers (if they havn't seen it already). Titled "Lockheed Martin details advanced design studies", it describes a few future US military aircraft requirements and L-M's proposals to fulfill the roles. Included is the 'New Strategic Aircraft" (NSA)-a C-141/KC-135 replacement, the "Common Support Aircraft" (CSA)-US Navy S-3/E-2/C-2 replacement and the "Large Strategic Aircraft" to replace the C-5. Interestingly, it also mentions a "New Tactical Transport" described as: "a possible successor to the C-130...resembles a scaled-up Lockheed-Martin- Boeing F-22. This concept combines stealth with speed, range and short-field /unprepared-airstrip capability." I wonder if there's any relation to the mysterious SENIOR CITIZEN and misc. VTOL black wings discussed here often? The article also has 4 illustrations produced by FI itself, one shows the L-M CSA-301 proposal, a tail-less diamond wing incorporating " full low observability" conformal sensor arrays and thrust vectoring. Also mentioned is an unmanned CSA design that looks like TACIT BLUE with a twin-boom tail. K ------------------------------ From: FSalles@trip.com.br (Felipe Salles) Date: Fri, 25 Oct 1996 14:16:46 -0200 Subject: Small scale tecnology-proving aircraft Recently postings to this mailing list commented on reported sightings of strange triangular shaped aircraft (in the UK if I'm not mistaken...). This sent my imagination reeling... Both the F117 and the B2 were preceded by smaller aircraft to prove that the concept worked before full production comitment (Have Blue end Tacit Blue, also if memory doesn't fail...). The canceled MDD A16 Avenger seems to be to my untrained eyes, much more radical and un-orthodox in it's design (and risky!) than any of the two aircraft above. Curiously MDD's Avenger program did not spawn it's own small scale test-bed sibling. IF there ever was such a craft, could it be a black program of some sort? Also could it explain the recent sightings? I welcome your comments... Felipe ------------------------------ From: JOHN SZALAY Date: Sat, 26 Oct 96 21:57:30 EDT Subject: Another store location. Along with the Skunk-works gift store & the Boeing store, I can now add the RRVA "country store". http://www2.eos.net/RRVA/store.html The selection of books available at this site appears to be excellent. RRVA = Red River Valley Fighter Pilots Assoc. Thank you Ed for the lead... (Thunder) John Szalay jpszalay@tacl.dnet.ge.com ------------------------------ From: David Date: Mon, 28 Oct 1996 17:58:57 Subject: LASRE As AW&ST is apparently no longer available in the UK (according to my newsagent) can anyone update me on the SR/LASRE test ? Seems to be running quite a bit behind schedule, so I wonder what's gone wrong...the devil's in the detail I suppose... Thanks David ------------------------------ From: "J. Pharabod" Date: Tue, 29 Oct 96 16:26:39 MET Subject: Re: Meteor or Space Plane? According to Caltech Seismology Lab, it was a meteorite (see below). I think it was this Lab which detected the (mythical ?) Aurora skyquakes a couple of years ago (am I wrong ?). J. Pharabod - - - - - - - - - - - From: baalke@kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov (Ron Baalke) Newsgroups: sci.astro,alt.sci.planetary,sci.astro.amateur,sci.geo.geology Subject: Caltech Seismology Lab Helps Pinpoint Location of Meteorite Fall Date: 25 Oct 1996 23:04 UT Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory For Immediate Release Caltech Seismo Lab gets location data on Oct. 3 meteor PASADENA- Should anyone be inclined to do a bit of meteorite hunting this weekend for a $5,000 reward, Caltech seismologist Kate Hutton thinks she can provide some help. According to Hutton, any larger chunks from the meteor that lit up the Western skies on the night of Oct. 3 may have landed in the Rose Valley area near Little Lake. Hutton figured this out by analyzing data from 31 of the seismic stations belonging to the Southern California Seismographic Network (operated by Caltech and the U.S. Geological Survey). "As it fell, the atmospheric drag caused the meteroid to explode in mid-air at least twice," Hutton says. "The explosions generated sound waves in the air similar to a sonic boom, which were detected by the seismographs. Using a procedure that is very similar to the one used to locate earthquakes underground, I used the arrival times of the sound waves at the various seismic stations to estimate where the explosions occurred." Two of the explosions were well located, Hutton adds. Both were 20 to 30 miles above the Fivemile Canyon area in the eastern Sierra foothills. The explosions were separated by about 25 seconds, and the second was about five miles lower than the first and about a mile further eastward. Based on this data and on eyewitness accounts provided by John Wasson of UCLA and Mark Boslough (Ph. D. from Caltech, 1984) of Sandia National Laboratory in New Mexico, Hutton thinks that any larger fragments that survived the firey entry into Earth's atmosphere would have landed to the east-northeast of the explosions, perhaps in the Rose Valley area near Little Lake. Smaller fragments may have fallen more or less straight down from where the explosions occurred. The Little Lake area would probably be the more seductive area to search, and for a very good reason. UCLA has offered a $5,000 reward for the first fragment that weighs at least four ounces. Hutton says the seismographic instruments didn't pick up a meteorite impact on Earth, but this is not surprising, since a single fragment would probably have to weigh several tons in order for its impact to be detected. The term "meteorite," by the way, refers to chunks of extraterrestrial debris that survive the entry into the atmosphere and end up on the ground. "Meteoroids" are chunks that travel through space, while "meteor" is the proper designation for the light show produced by a rock from outer space slowing down in the Earth's atmosphere. Any surviving meteorite fragments would probably have a fresh black matte crust. If the meteorite struck something on the ground, part of the crust might have chipped off to reveal a lighter interior. If anyone finds a meteorite fragment weighing at least four ounces, he or she should get in touch with Dr. John Wasson at UCLA. Wasson's e-mail address is wasson@igpp.ucla.edu. Contact: Robert Tindol (818) 395-3631 tindol@caltech.edu ------------------------------ From: John Stone Date: Tue, 29 Oct 1996 16:40:06 -0500 Subject: Richard Graham at Blackbird Airpark... Hello All, For all you lower west coasters, Richard Graham will be out at Blackbird Airpark on Nov. 1st and 2nd signing (and I'm sure selling!) "SR-71 Revealed, The Inside Story", from 10:30am -3:30pm Blackbird Airpark is located at: 25th Street East and Avenue P, in Palmdale, CA. You can call AFFTC Museum at 805-277-8050 for more info, if needed. Best, John | / ^ \ ___|___ -(.)==<.>==(.)- --------o---((.))---o-------- SR-71 Blackbird U-2 Dragon Lady John Stone jstone@thepoint.net U-2 and SR-71 Web Page:http://www.thepoint.net/~jstone/blackbird.html ------------------------------ From: Mary Shafer Date: Wed, 30 Oct 1996 14:29:37 -0500 (EST) Subject: Re: LASRE Boy, you really know how to hurt a person, don't you.? Yes, it's running behind. The LASRE has not yet managed a ground firing, let alone all of the testing required before NASA will accept it. We are going to fly the airplane again on the 14th, mostly to check the instrumentation. The problems with the LASRE aren't NASA's, so I'm not really going to say much about them. Besides, I'm only interested in it once it gets on the SR, so I don't know much. To the best of my knowledge, it's been stuff like valves that have caused the problems. I haven't heard that design defects were a problem. Regards, Mary Mary Shafer DoD #0362 KotFR shafer@ursa-major.spdcc.com URL http://www.dfrc.nasa.gov/People/Shafer/mary.html Some days it don't come easy/And some days it don't come hard Some days it don't come at all/And these are the days that never end.... On Mon, 28 Oct 1996, David wrote: > As AW&ST is apparently no longer available in the UK (according to my > newsagent) can anyone update me on the SR/LASRE test ? > > Seems to be running quite a bit behind schedule, so I wonder what's gone > wrong...the devil's in the detail I suppose... > > Thanks > > David > > ------------------------------ From: David Date: Wed, 30 Oct 1996 22:00:58 Subject: Re: LASRE Mary wrote: >Boy, you really know how to hurt a person, don't you.? > >Yes, it's running behind. The LASRE has not yet managed a ground firing, >let alone all of the testing required before NASA will accept it. We are >going to fly the airplane again on the 14th, mostly to check the >instrumentation. > >The problems with the LASRE aren't NASA's, so I'm not really going to say >much about them. Besides, I'm only interested in it once it gets on the >SR, so I don't know much. To the best of my knowledge, it's been stuff >like valves that have caused the problems. I haven't heard that design >defects were a problem. To quote John Lennon "I didn't mean to hurt you." but it's cold and dark over here in England now that winter's almost here, and it permeates the soul ! I got the impression that the problems lay with the aerospike rather than on NASA's side. Snags with valves and stuff is what I meant by the devil's in the detail..honest. Good to hear that you'll be lighting the fires and kickin' the tyres on the 14th. On a different subject: When did the X-CRV become the X-38 ? I was looking at the images not long ago and it didn't have that designation...what's the latest on it ? Best David ------------------------------ From: John Burtenshaw Date: Fri, 01 Nov 1996 11:03:42 -0100 Subject: Test mail Hi All Is this list still active - I've not had anything for a week Cheers John =========================================================================== John Burtenshaw Internet Applications Developer The Computer Centre, Bournemouth University - --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Postal Address: Talbot Campus, Fern Barrow, POOLE, Dorset, BH12 5BB U.K. Internet: jburtens@bournemouth.ac.uk Phone: 01202 595293 Mobile: 0850 240931 =========================================================================== ------------------------------ From: habu@why.net (habu) Date: Thu, 31 Oct 1996 22:25:29 -0800 Subject: testing I haven't received a post on this list for nearly a week. I sent a 'who' to Majordomo and I'm still on the list. Is everyone on vacation? hibernating? just checking... Greg Fieser ------------------------------ End of Skunk Works Digest V5 #722 ********************************* 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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