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The fuel/bomb pods on the old B-58 Hustler strategic bomber look to be about the same size as SpaceShipOne, the suborbital winner of the X-Prize. Instead of the slow launch plane they use now, if you could find a flying B-58 you could get up to mach 2 before you even lit SpaceShipOne's rocket. Might
even double how high it would go. Richard Branson, who's taken a great interest in the SpaceShipOne program, could probably buy one of these with change he found in the love seat of one of his private jets. (Assuming he lets hundreds of thousand of dollars in spare change fall out of his pocket when he sits down, as all Billionaires should.)
B-58 Hustler
http://www.aerospac...mber/b58/b58_04.jpg
I'm going for a cup of tea now.......... [normzone, May 21 2005]
Perfomance specs - B-58 Hustler
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B-58_Hustler
[Klaatu, May 22 2005]
XB-70 Valkyrie
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XB-70
[Laimak, May 22 2005]
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Larry Flynt is an aerospace advocate ? And the band that did "Rock Lobster" is involved ? I can hardly wait to see the paint job. |
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Another reason why space ... vast, empty domain ... doesn't appeal to me as it did when I was a kid: I want to ride slung under a B-58! |
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A far wealthier person than Branson already underwrites Spaceship One. |
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I just remembered that researching an idea I had for the X prize is how I found the bakery.
I think my idea was a large expandible doughnut shaped balloon with a rocket engine at the center.
Funding would have been a minor problem, though. |
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You're going to use energy to get up there & go that fast either way. But it'd be a good idea if you're going up with the B-58 anyway. Kill two stones with one bird. |
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Thank you for the link normzone. Beautiful shot. |
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Actually, this is a great idea. The service ceiling of the B-58 Hustler is over 13,000 feet higher than the White Knight<link>, and with the extra speed, they may be able to milk a bit more altitude out of SpaceShip One. [+] |
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Might as well pull an XB-70 Valkyrie out of the museum and use it. Was a beautiful plane and was retired due to a bad luck incident. See link. |
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If the Valkyrie uses supersonic compression lifting for its high-flying, then you'd screw everything up by toting SpaceShip One under its belly. |
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B-58 looks like it'd work, though. |
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//XB-70 Valkyrie// Dad was a hydraulics engineer on the B-70 construction. As a wee lad I was allowed in the hangar, once, and thought it was God. Bring it back, please. |
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SpaceShipOne is only 16.4 feet long, might even fit in the internal bay. |
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//might even fit in the internal bay// Hmm, I can believe SpaceShipOne withstands supersonic speeds in flight, but zero to Mach2+ in the time it takes to open the bay doors? |
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I completely fail to comprehend your anno, [TolpuddleSartre] |
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I was expecting a weight problem with this idea, but it turns out there’s 280kg to spare. However, intuitively (though I’m not qualified to say), I think there’s an aerodynamics problem. Spaceship One would ride *in* the shock wave of the B-58. This is bad, no? |
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Oh, and keep all doors and windows closed at mach 2 – dogs like to stick their head out. |
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[Laimak] I assume the bomb bay maintains zero airflow over its contents until the bay doors are opened. That is going to be one almighty shock hitting a lightweight structure in a very short time when they open - much shorter than the airframe would suffer if the spacecraft were to accelerate itself to that speed. Maybe I misunderstand aerodynamics, which, on the whole, is probably more than likely. |
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Bomb doors on a Concorde? (after all, the original idea was for a long-range, supersonic nuclear bomber as a development of the Vulcan) Mind you, Branson tried and failed to resurrect these too. Also, I agree that dropping the little plastic egg that makes up the fuselage of SS1 out into a Mach 2 airstream could rattle the windows a bit... |
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you could use a b-58 if you climbed at a very steep angle at max throttle. once the air got too thin for you to get much useful thrust, the plane would coast in a arc. the top of the arc would be the slowest point in the plane's travel. if the ascent was steep enough, the top point speed would only be a few hundred mph, very favorable for launching eggs into space... |
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What a fantastically thunderbird-style vehicle the B-58 is. |
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I think they're breathtaking to look at. I saw a documentary about the B-58 and all the macho, tough-guy pilots said it was the plane's beauty, first and foremost that drew them to want to fly it. One guy said: "It looked like it was going a hundred miles an hour just sitting on the tarmac." |
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[TolpuddleSartre] the B-58's "bomb bays" are open when it's carrying the pod, which protrudes. However I don't think this'd work easily because SS1 has wings (which the pods didn't). |
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[baconbrain] I assume you're still rummaging around NAA, sleeping behind packing crates, occasionally stopping to post something on the 'net when nobody's around. (I would be) |
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Without insulting the Limeys more than usual, the B-58 is easily in competition with the Vulcan in the "drop dead gorgeous" category. |
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Best looking planes in each catagory: |
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Prop = P-51 (Spitfire, Mosquito, honorable
mention) |
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5th generation jet - F-22 |
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By the way, spell checker not recognizing
"Sopwith"? Scandalous. |
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By the way again, that being said I'm a big fan of
ugly.
The P-47 "Jug" and the Hawker Hurricane actually
won the war while their prettier sisters got all the
acclaim. |
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Fighters:
inline engine: P51, Spitfire (Honourable Mention: Tomahawk)
radial engine: P47, FW109 (HM to Corsair)
rotary engine: Sopwith Camel |
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Bombers: He-111, Mosquito |
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Fighter: not a real contest: F104D (HM F102)
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Bombers: Vulcan for sheer awesome grace, B58 for "Mach 1 while parked" look |
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Modern aircraft... yeah, sorry, the stuff from the '50s still rocks. |
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I'd agree with the Starfighter but I'd throw Hawker
Sea Fury at the front of the pack for radial engine
planes. Even if it was an FW-190 ripoff. |
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I've also seen them race. Breathtaking. |
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Even airliners: the deHavilland Albatross was quite graceful. |
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Some of the Russian Cold-War bombers were quite swoopy looking too. The (wwii) Mig-3 was overly aerodynamic-looking. |
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FW-109: looks like a dog with a big head - cute, but in a rather masculine way... why would you say the Sea Fury's a FW ripoff ? |
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The Vigilante's a bit old to be considered "modern" . . . for currently in service, I'd go with the Sukhoi: there's that graceful curve at the front. |
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From the Wikipedia page: "In an unusual test
program, live bears and chimpanzees were
successfully used to test the ejection system." |
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How on Earth do you get a live bear into an ejector
seat in the first place? |
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Dunno, but I'd guess you wouldn't get it into the seat twice, without some argument or a tranquilizer dart. |
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//How on Earth do you get a live bear into an
ejector seat in the first place?// |
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Here's the story of the Sea Fury: |
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"On 23 June, 1942, Luftwaffe Pilot Oberleutnant
Arnim Faber erroneously landed his Focke-Wulf Fw
190A-3 fighter at RAF Pembrey, apparently having
mistaken this airfield for a Luftwaffe channel
coast airfield. The British were thereby presented
with a working example of the Fw 190 fighter,
which had been giving the RAF an extremely
difficult time. The Hawker Fury design was a direct
result of the examination of Faber's Fw 190A-3." |
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The pilot's story sounds a little suspicious. He
might have "accidentally" landed in a place that
would result in him surviving the war in an English
POW camp as opposed to flying for the Luftwaffe
until victory or death. Germany didn't have a 3rd
retirement plan. Then
again... this was after the Battle of Britain when a
couple of thousand German pilots got killed in a
totally failed campaign. Just sayin'. |
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By the way, yes, the FW-190 does look like a
bulldog. |
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The Hawker Tempest Mk.2 (predecessor of the Sea Fury) incorporated some captured FWs' canopy design and radial engine mounting features. The Fury would have gotten that second-hand I suppose. I don't think anything else was on it though. |
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Bun for mentioning the B58. But as beautiful and
high performance as it was... the Hustler was
cancelled because it was a pig to maintain, it cost 3x
what a B52 did to keep flying. |
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You'd be able to gain on the original performance
though... no cannon, no 1200lb 'computer' ...in fact
no
pilot... you could fly it remotely. |
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over 100 aircraft produced isn't "cancelled". |
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Unless I'm mistaken the aerodynamics of separating
a parasite craft at mach speeds are somewhat
problematic, and haven't actually been solved yet. |
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Haven't heard anything about that. The B-58s under-
pod was dropped at supersonic speed with no
problem. |
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ok, 'cancelled' wasn't a great word. But it was
tricky to fly, harder to land, was an intensive user
of in flight fuelling... it was pretty much
unrecoverable in the event of a supersonic engine
failure. These factors led to 20% of them
crashing... which is a scary number no matter how
you slice it, and would be a serious worry for a
launch platform. |
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IT was retired from service pretty quickly, 10 years
is nothing compared to the service lives of the
B52/Vulcan/B1b/F111/B2 . |
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I think there was also some questioning of the
rationale of having a "supersonic dash" attack profile
in the age of increasingly effective ground to air
missile systems as well. |
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I also think the ICBM had for the most part reached
it's present level of effectiveness so such an
expensive nuclear weapons delivery system was hard
to justify. |
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I may be wrong, but I've read it on various parasitic
launch sites. There is a significant difference
between dropping a tumbling pod (even if it
stabilizes during the fall), and separating a craft in a
state where it can fire its own engines. |
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Well, I'd have to read your reference but I know that
missiles are launched from supersonic aircraft. The
Space Shuttle also ejects it's boosters at high
supersonic speed. You may have to give the
separating aircraft a kick though. |
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