From: owner-skunk-works-digest@netwrx1.com (skunk-works-digest) To: skunk-works-digest@netwrx1.com Subject: skunk-works-digest V7 #56 Reply-To: skunk-works@netwrx1.com Sender: owner-skunk-works-digest@netwrx1.com Errors-To: owner-skunk-works-digest@netwrx1.com Precedence: bulk skunk-works-digest Friday, August 28 1998 Volume 07 : Number 056 Index of this digest by subject: *************************************************** RE: First Hypersonic Propulsion Hardware Delivered Re: Aurora Reality F-22 engine (F119) weight Re: First Hypersonic Propulsion Hardware Delivered Re: First Hypersonic Propulsion Hardware Delivered RE: First Hypersonic Propulsion Hardware Delivered Re: First Hypersonic Propulsion Hardware Delivered RE: Logic, no SR-71 Replacement ... Re: F-22 engine (F119) weight Re: Reason to keep the SR down... Re: F-22 engine (F119) weight RE: Reason to keep the SR down... Skunk Works President Jack Gordon Re:Agena and hydrogen fuel Re: F-22 engine (F119) weight RE: First Hypersonic Propulsion Hardware Delivered RE: Reason to keep the SR down... and more Darkstar *************************************************** ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1998 08:45:20 -0700 From: "Erik Hoel" Subject: RE: First Hypersonic Propulsion Hardware Delivered Martin Hurst wrote: ... chop ... > Also in this article, "supersonic (faster than Mach 1 or the speed of > sound). The fuel for the X-43 will be hydrogen." > Wasn't this type of fuel experimented by Ben Rich when they were > studying a successor to the U-2, but Kelly concluded that the actual > plane would be to big and the production and storage of the fuel too > difficult ? Yes - the project was named Suntan and there is a nice amount of info on it in Jay Miller's Skunkworks book (it was very large, ~200' long). Kelly Johnson came to the understanding that the plane would not have a long enough unrefueled range (~2000-2500 miles) and would not be able to grow. Interestingly, I was reading an excellent book on the history of the space program (both ours and the Russians - the book is "Countdown", by T. A. Heppenheimer, Wiley, 1997) and they mentioned the development of hydrogen fueled rocket engines. Apparently, P&W (Mr. Pratt in particular) was working on the problem of hydrogen fueled jet engines for Suntan - when this was canceled, they took their knowledge and developed the first hydrogen fueled rocket engine. This engine was first mated to Agena (recall it serving as a docking/rendezvous target for Gemini). Hydrogen/oxygen engines are considered superior to kerosene/oxygen engines from the standpoint of their higher energy content. Disclaimer - details fuzzy as I am not an aerospace engineer. Erik - -- Erik Hoel mailto:ehoel@esri.com Environmental Systems Research Institute http://www.esri.com 380 New York Street 909-793-2853 (x1-1548) tel Redlands, CA 92373-8100 909-307-3067 fax ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1998 16:51:44 From: win@writer.win-uk.net (David) Subject: Re: Aurora Patrick wrote: >.......On the other hand if we are going to >turn this list into a ufo type speculative adventure fueled by paranoia and >imagination someone better start coming up with something logical, with >hard evidence that is conclusive. I am not looking for any evidence or any >information on Aurora, or any other program of a speculative nature. With respect, the Aurora and dare I mention the TR-3 were both mentioned by name on the 'OK to talk about' list of this forum when I joined it a few years back, so its hardly UFO stuff. As far as hard proof is concerned, that is only going to be available when and if 'black' a/c are acknowledged. I'm reminded of the reports of a strange looking a/c that had been met with considerable amusement from many aviation watchers a good few years back. Only when TACIT BLUE was rolled out the hangar did they take it seriously. Now those same doubters will happily correct others on its specs. because they can look in a book. That's fine, but implicit in your comments is the belief that any reports of unknowns are to be treated as the ramblings of disfunctional, paranoid personalities presumably prone to fantasy, Unless I'm mistaken the TB programme ran from '78-'85 - it was de-classified in around '96.- over a decade from its last flight. TB was a research a/c, rather than an operational one, so you can imagine how long it might be before an operational 'black' a/c is acknowledged. Surely the best way to approach discussion of 'black' a/c on this list is to ballot its members to see if such discussions are appropriate here. I know one thing for sure: the black delta that Chris Gibson saw over the North Sea in '89 has never been acknowledged and that case alone proves beyond any shadow of a doubt that there are such a/c flying around. What it is and what it does remains unknown, but the US is hardly going to be flying experimental a/c over this side of the Pond. I hope it was a UK project that was being re-fuelled by a KC-135 with 2 F-111s close by, though I wouldn't put money on it. David ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1998 09:20:02 -0700 (PDT) From: David Lednicer Subject: Reality A couple of points to consider: 1) Darkstar was designed and developed by a joint Lockheed/Boeing team. You can't heap all the glory on Lockheed, as it was 50% Boeing. However, privately, people at the SW blame a lot of the problems (wrong wing incidence that had to be fixed with a band-aid, crash on second flight, etc.) on Boeing. 2) What made the Skunk Works great was that Kelly Johnson was able to personally fight off attempts by others to get control over his operation and he hated bureacuracy. Since he retired, the fight has been lost. Take a look at the Ben Rich book - he admits this. People who work there (or have worked there) say that today's SW is a far cry from that of 30 years ago. In many ways, it really is just the old "White" Lockheed Burbank, moved to Palmdale and made "Black". 3) Don't believe the SW management is highly enlightened. They had a rather large layoff in the early 1990s. I have seen evidence that they are just like any other large organization. That is one reason I don't work there. I also don't like Antelope Valley. Lastly, I have not been overly impressed with the level of technology aero-wise that I have seen at the SW. I have better tools at my disposal here. 4) I don't believe Aurora exists. From what I have seen, there are many problems associated with hypersonic cruise flight that have never been solved. Furthermore, I don't think there are solutions to many of these problems. Lastly, people at the SW have been instructed to tell others that they work on Aurora when asked what they do! 5) As I keep saying, there are actually many skunk works active out there. Boeing Military here in Seattle has one, Mac in St. Louis, now Boeing, has the Phantom Works. GD, now Lockheed, in Fort Worth has one. GD/Convair in San Diego had one. Northrop has one. Grumman used to have one. Rockwell had one. The major difference between them and Lockheed's is that Kelly Johnson got noticed by the press (or he liked to brag). The others have also done spectacular things, but quietly. 6) If the Skunk Works of 30-45 years ago had been exposed to the sort of public scrutiny that today's is, it would have been deemed a failure. There were many fatal crashes of the F-104, U-2 and A-11/YF-12/SR-71 in their development phases. The original F-104 was a Turkey and it had to be reengined. The A-11/YF-12/SR-71 went way over budget and was late. More recently, the first production F-117 crashed on its first flight. 7) I think the ultimate evidence that the SR-71 can be retired is that we won the Gulf War without it. Yes, it is sad that it is gone, but the Cold War is over. - ------------------------------------------------------------------- David Lednicer | "Applied Computational Fluid Dynamics" Analytical Methods, Inc. | email: dave@amiwest.com 2133 152nd Ave NE | tel: (425) 643-9090 Redmond, WA 98052 USA | fax: (425) 746-1299 ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1998 12:25:56 -0400 From: "James P. Stevenson" Subject: F-22 engine (F119) weight Does anyone have a clue what the weight of the F119 engine is for the F-22? I am interested in engine weight and thrust vectoring weight separately or together? Jim Stevenson ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1998 10:43:44 -0600 From: Brad Hitch Subject: Re: First Hypersonic Propulsion Hardware Delivered Martin Hurst wrote: > > This may be a fairly long article but I couldn't shorten it, for sake of > loosing some critical information. > I'm kind of surprised that information of this type is being publically > announced. I would have thought that it would have been part of some > black op's secret program, solely for the purposes of recon intel, etc. > !?!?!? > > Also in this article, "supersonic (faster than Mach 1 or the speed of > sound). The > fuel for the X-43 will be hydrogen." > Wasn't this type of fuel experimented by Ben Rich when they were > studying a succussor to the U-2, but Kelly concluded that the actual > plane would be to big and the production and storage of the fuel too > difficult ? > > -Martin > > > From: NASANews@hq.nasa.gov[SMTP:NASANews@hq.nasa.gov] > > Sent: Thursday, August 27, 1998 12:25 PM > > Subject: First Hypersonic Propulsion Hardware Delivered > > > > RELEASE: 98-154 > > > > FIRST HYPERSONIC PROPULSION HARDWARE DELIVERED > > > > A revolutionary new engine that ultimately may reduce > > the cost of putting payloads in orbit has been delivered to > > NASA for testing. > > > > The 30-inch long "scramjet" engine was fabricated by > > GASL, Inc., Ronkonkoma, NY, for the Hyper-X program, an > > ambitious research effort to demonstrate hypersonic > > propulsion technologies in flight. > > >snip The existence of this program has been public from its inception since NASA is a CIVILIAN space agency. The smattering of technical data released here has been included in classic texts as Hill and Peterson's "Mechanics and Thermodynamics of Propulsion" since the 1950's. However, if you called Langley and asked for the inlet and combustor flowpath drawings and the engine cycle deck you would not be getting a fat package in the mail anytime soon. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1998 10:48:19 -0600 From: Brad Hitch Subject: Re: First Hypersonic Propulsion Hardware Delivered Erik Hoel wrote: > Interestingly, I was reading an excellent book on the history of the space > program (both ours and the Russians - the book is "Countdown", by T. A. > Heppenheimer, Wiley, 1997) and they mentioned the development of hydrogen > fueled rocket engines. Apparently, P&W (Mr. Pratt in particular) was working > on the problem of hydrogen fueled jet engines for Suntan - when this was > canceled, they took their knowledge and developed the first hydrogen fueled > rocket engine. This engine was first mated to Agena (recall it serving as a Pratt and Whitney started a machine shop in the 1850's (I think it was in Connecticut or Massachusetts). Surely, this wasn't "the" Mr. Pratt. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1998 10:15:32 -0700 From: tonydinkel@clubnet.net Subject: RE: First Hypersonic Propulsion Hardware Delivered >This engine was first mated to Agena (recall it serving as a >docking/rendezvous target for Gemini). Hydrogen/oxygen engines are >considered superior to kerosene/oxygen engines from the standpoint of their >higher energy content. Seems to me production Agenas used UDMH RFNA as fuels. At least that combination was used at Vandenberg in the 60's. td ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1998 10:25:40 -0700 (PDT) From: Wei-Jen Su Subject: Re: First Hypersonic Propulsion Hardware Delivered On Fri, 28 Aug 1998, Brad Hitch wrote: > Martin Hurst wrote: > > > The existence of this program has been public from its inception since > NASA is a CIVILIAN space agency. The smattering of technical data > released here has been included in classic texts as Hill and Peterson's > "Mechanics and Thermodynamics of Propulsion" since the 1950's. However, > if you called Langley and asked for the inlet and combustor flowpath > drawings and the engine cycle deck you would not be getting a fat > package in the mail anytime soon. > This is true. A few months back, I was in one of those regional AIAA meeting and I spoke with Anthony Castrogiovani (President of GASL, the company that develop the scramjet for the Hyper-X). He told me almost everything about the Hyper-X except how they manage the supersonic combustion. May the Force be with you Wei-Jen Su E-mail: wsu@cco.caltech.edu "Find a job you love and you will never have to work a day in your life." Confucius ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 28 Aug 98 18:29:53 GMT From: betnal@ns.net Subject: RE: Logic, no SR-71 Replacement ... On 8/27/98 8:57PM, in message , Dan Zinngrabe wrote: > >If there was a replacement for the SR-71 but he didn't want to tell > >about it, he won't have to lie about it or even mention that there was a > >2 day delay in getting the recon data. > > Assuming the delay was in getting the data, not processing it. > > If the data was digital, processing time would be negligible, and iterpretation wouldn't take that long for BDA vs. recon. If it was wet film, the nearest processing capability would be aboard an aircraft carrier (I doubt Aurora has a tailhook) or in England and that would take time. For BDA, though, you'd want to use digital. > > Of course, the US has never officially admitted it has reconaissance > satellites save for Corona, and it took them how long to unwrap that little > gem? > > True, but we knew that there were recon satellites, even if they weren't acknowledged, by the early 1960s. Also, we took public actions based on data from these "unidentified" sources. This lack of this latter is what tends to make be think there's no operational "Aurora". Art ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 28 Aug 98 19:30:06 GMT From: betnal@ns.net Subject: Re: F-22 engine (F119) weight The model in the YF-22 weighed between 2,800 and 2,900 lbs. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 28 Aug 98 19:48:45 GMT From: betnal@ns.net Subject: Re: Reason to keep the SR down... This is a follow-up to something I posted a couple of weeks back. In it I postulated that one of the reasons the Administration may want the SR-71 killed is that if it keeps flying, it'll be used. If it's used, it might find something seriously unpleasant. This would mean the Administration would actually have to deal with something seriously unpleasant, so to avoid this it eliminates one of our best tactical and "surprise" intel platforms for getting data from hostile areas. I noted that there was a report of a Washington Post article that cited unnamed sources on our investigating team in Iraq that the US Government for the past few years had been pressuring them to not look to closely or do surprise inspections for fear that they might find something and this would force the Administration to actually confront Saddam. Well, the Chief US inspector over there has returned and resigned. He is now publicly stating that the team has been blocked by Our government from finding violations. Among the revelations were 6 times when they were on the verge of uncovering denied weapons and capabilities and were ordered to back off and suppress the evidence in order to avoid a confrontation. Given this confirmation, it's not hard to postulate that the SR may be being put down because it's too good. There are other place where we have made assurances that everything is just fine due to our brilliant diplomacy and we'd just as soon not have the capability to look for real (can you say North Korea, boys and girls?). Just a thought. Not all the reasons for decisions are based in capabilities, needs or costs. In defense of Darkstar: Keep in mind that Darkstar has always been the more technologically risky of the two platforms. Also, one of the reasons Global Hawk may have been more successful in its limited testing so far is that they just kept it on the ground for years behind schedule, while the Darkstar team chose to fly. For the paranoid, since Darkstar was supposed to give us some capability to recon hostile airspace, some of the factor I cited above may be at play here as well. No public evidence of this, of course. Art ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1998 16:07:21 -0400 From: "James P. Stevenson" Subject: Re: F-22 engine (F119) weight Art, Thanks for the quick reply. Can you share with my how certain you are and why you feel certain of this figure? As a point of interest, the figure I have for the EMD engine and thrust vectoring add-on at the time of contract award was 3,875 pounds. I have also had people tell me that the thrust vectoring apparatus could easily weight 1,000 pounds. So your numbers appear in the ball park. Jim >The model in the YF-22 weighed between 2,800 and 2,900 lbs. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1998 16:40:55 -0400 From: Martin Hurst Subject: RE: Reason to keep the SR down... In the world of spying, espionage, intel-recon, anything is possible, truth-lie-silience-coverup-manipluate-etc.. So what we the public are actually are told and hear, who knows !?!?! I hear what you're say, Art. But the mil has many things that they know about from intel &/or recon, that we will probably never know about, some serious and dangerous things. I'm not convinced that the mil, pentagon, and even top govt & congressman officials, would close and blind eye to any of these potential threats and hope they go away and nothing happens. With that in mind, I would think that they, knowing these real threats, would be trying to develop even better intel-recon platforms, in the interest of NATIONAL SECURITY. The other side being, that of a public out-cry and embarrassment should the mil/govt be taken by surprise [Politicians don't like that] - India for example, or a chemical bomb blast on US soil. - -Martin Hurst Art Wrote: > -----Original Message----- > From: betnal@ns.net [SMTP:betnal@ns.net] > Sent: Friday, August 28, 1998 3:49 PM > To: skunk-works@netwrx1.com > Subject: Re: Reason to keep the SR down... > ... the Administration may want the SR-71 killed is > that if it keeps flying, it'll be used. If it's used, it might find > something > seriously unpleasant. This would mean the Administration would > actually have to > deal with something seriously unpleasant, so to avoid this it > eliminates one of > our best tactical and "surprise" intel platforms for getting data from > hostile > areas. ... since Darkstar was supposed to give us some capability to recon > hostile airspace, ... above may be at play here as well. > No public evidence of this, of course. > > ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1998 15:56:32 -0700 From: G&G Subject: Skunk Works President Jack Gordon The C.R. Smith Museum is sponsoring a lecture series this summer. Past speakers have included Chuck Yeager, Scott Crossfield, and Joe Kittinger. The next speaker will be Mr. Jack Gordon, President of the Lockheed Martin Skunk Works, on October 9th, 1998, at the Grapevine Convention Center, just north of the DFW (Dallas/Fort Worth, TX) Airport. For more information, contact either myself or Jay Miller off list. Maybe Mr. Gordon will answer the question about whether Lockheed has lost its superior technological touch... :) Greg Fieser ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1998 19:44:39 -0300 From: "Kim Keller" Subject: Re:Agena and hydrogen fuel This is a multi-part message in MIME format. - ------=_NextPart_000_0029_01BDD2BC.4B321560 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Erik Hoel wrote: Apparently, P&W (Mr. Pratt in particular) was working on the problem of hydrogen fueled jet engines for Suntan - when this was canceled, they took their knowledge and developed the first hydrogen = fueled rocket engine. This engine was first mated to Agena (recall it serving = as a docking/rendezvous target for Gemini). Eric, Agena (another fine Lockheed product) was not a cryogenic stage. It used = red fuming nitric acid and a type of hydrazine as propellant. The first = hydrogen-fuelled stage was the Centaur, which used the P&W RL-10 engine. = This stage has been in use for over 35 years, and is the highest power = upper stage available in the US.=20 Regards, Kim - ------=_NextPart_000_0029_01BDD2BC.4B321560 Content-Type: text/html; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
Erik Hoel wrote:
 
Apparently, P&W (Mr. Pratt in particular) was working
on the = problem=20 of hydrogen fueled jet engines for Suntan - when this was
canceled, = they took=20 their knowledge and developed the first hydrogen fueled
rocket = engine. This=20 engine was first mated to Agena (recall it serving as = a
docking/rendezvous=20 target for Gemini).
 
Eric,
 
Agena (another fine Lockheed product) was not a cryogenic stage. It = used=20 red fuming nitric acid and a type of hydrazine as propellant. The first=20 hydrogen-fuelled stage was the Centaur, which used the P&W RL-10 = engine.=20 This stage has been in use for over 35 years, and is the highest power = upper=20 stage available in the US.
 
Regards,
 
Kim
- ------=_NextPart_000_0029_01BDD2BC.4B321560-- ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 28 Aug 98 23:53:24 GMT From: betnal@ns.net Subject: Re: F-22 engine (F119) weight On 8/28/98 1:07PM, in message , "James P. Stevenson" wrote: > Art, > > Thanks for the quick reply. Can you share with my how certain you are and > why you feel certain of this figure? > > I figured USAF would classify the number on the F119, just based on their history (they did). I also figured it wouldn't occur to them that there wouldn't be that much difference between the basic structure of the engines in the ATF technology demonstrators and the ones in teh EMD and prodcution Raptors, so they'd forget to lock that info up. So, I looked for information on the YF-22. I also know NASA is doing work on studying advanced propulsion systems including military engines. Put the two of them together and I found NASA had a databade. So I queried on the engines in the YF-22 (but not the F-22), and the weight was there. Art Art ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1998 17:20:01 -0700 From: "Erik Hoel" Subject: RE: First Hypersonic Propulsion Hardware Delivered Kim Keller wrote: > Agena (another fine Lockheed product) was not a cryogenic stage. It > used red fuming nitric acid and a type of hydrazine as propellant. > The first hydrogen-fuelled stage was the Centaur, which used the P&W > RL-10 engine. This stage has been in use for over 35 years, and is > the highest power upper stage available in the US. And Tony Dinkel also wrote: > Seems to me production Agenas used UDMH RFNA as fuels. At least that > combination was used at Vandenberg in the 60's. Thanks for pointing out my errors in confusing Agena with Centaur. Sometimes its tough being on a list with so many smart people ... Erik - -- Erik Hoel mailto:ehoel@esri.com Environmental Systems Research Institute http://www.esri.com 380 New York Street 909-793-2853 (x1-1548) tel Redlands, CA 92373-8100 909-307-3067 fax ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 29 Aug 98 00:30:01 GMT From: betnal@ns.net Subject: RE: Reason to keep the SR down... and more Darkstar On 8/28/98 1:40PM, in message , Martin Hurst wrote: > > > I hear what you're say, Art. > > But the mil has many things that they know about from intel &/or recon, > that we will probably never know about, some serious and dangerous > things. > I'm not convinced that the mil, pentagon, and even top govt & > congressman officials, would close and blind eye to any of these > potential threats and hope they go away and nothing happens. > With that in mind, I would think that they, knowing these real threats, > would be trying to develop even better intel-recon platforms, in the > interest of NATIONAL SECURITY. > Remember, one of the best definitions of Washington is, "7 square miles surrounded by reality". Washington wants to build the F/A-18E/F even though they know better, after all. I agree there are many, many talented and dedicated people involved in the process. One of them just resigned and returned from Iraq. The problem is that too many of these people do not have the Washington power base to get the job done. I mentioned the Super Hornet for a reason. Once it became apparent that certain in factions in DoD wanted the plane despite all logic, if you didn't get with the program, you were shuffled off to some career ending make-work job. Let me cite another example. SECDEF Cheney canceled the V-22 Osprey which was a very stupid thing to do (trust me on this, I'm quite familiar with the program and the machinations going on). Without going into detail because it's outside the scope of this list, let me just point out that Congress thought this was crazy. They ordered him to commission an independent study to validate his reasoning and to act on their recommendations. They weren't careful enough, though, and let him pick the consultants and ground rules for the study. Osprey supporters thought the game was over at that point. However, the study group was composed of honest people. They came back and said that the decision was wrong, uneconomical and detrimental to the nation's security. The Osprey should proceed. Remember now, these are the people he picked Himself! Well, reversing his decision would mean a loss of face. So, he announced he would ignore the results of His Own study and the V-22 would stay dead. When Congress funded the program, he impounded the money (sound familiar?). It wasn't until Cheney left office and the Bush administration would not lose face by reversing its SECDEF (plus it was an election year) that the money for the V-22 was released. Given the today's even more stringent move to keep everyone singing the party line, why it be different now? They may (possibly) indeed be developing something new, but the SR-71 represents an embarrassment to those who killed it and that's a big driver. > The other side being, that of a public out-cry and embarrassment should > the mil/govt be taken by surprise [Politicians don't like that] - India > for example, or a chemical bomb blast on US soil. > Then politicians will blame someone lower down. :( The first time a flight of Super Hornets encountered a flight of exported Rafales (assuming good pilots) and gets its clock cleaned, Washington will scream at Navair and will wonder why no one warned them. Art > t > > Art Wrote: > > -----Original Message----- .. the Administration may want the SR-71 killed is > that if it keeps flying, it'll be used. If it's used, it might find > something > seriously unpleasant. > > ... since Darkstar was supposed to give us some capability to > recon > > hostile airspace, ... above may be at play here as well. > > No public evidence of this, of course. > > > > > Reading that again, I think I was wrong here. Darkstar is too far away from operational capability for that to factor in. Also, the statements that it should fly twice as high don't make much sense given that the reason for the 45,000 ft. height was that stealth would permit it to fly lower. To suddenly discover ounce that the stealthy vehicle should fly twice as high doesn't seem likely this far along. Besides if true, that means Global Hawk is wrong as well since it doesn't fly at that higher altitude and isn't stealthy to boot. Here's another thought: Lockheed recently sent out a letter directing its employees not to lobby for restoration of the SR-71. Many speculate this was due to pressure from DoD. I mentioned this and passed on the surmise that the JSF program may have been the threat (excuse me, persuasion) used. On reflection JSF is still a ways away, and threats to it can be countered in upcoming years (and Administrations). On the other hand... Although it won't be operational for years, Darkstar will start generating good profits for Lockheed and Boeing in the near future. This leak of a discovery that Darkstar may not have a future is an immediate occurrence. It bubbled up around the time Lockheed suddenly sent out its directive. Darkstar...cancellation...now There's a Club! :o Art ------------------------------ End of skunk-works-digest V7 #56 ******************************** To subscribe to skunk-works-digest, send the command: subscribe in the body of a message to "majordomo@netwrx1.com". 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