The National Museum of the USAF has recently posted some interesting videos of their XB-70. Something the museum seems to be doing is filming their exhibits using drones; the angles aren’t always the best, but they do provide angles rarely seen before.
A meeting of giants at Edwards Air Force Base in the late 1960’s. It’s interesting to compare the size of the “fighter” with the “bomber…” the bomber, as anyone who has ever stood underneath the sole example in Dayton, is Really Big, but the YF-12 is just not that much smaller. Sustained Mach 3 flight is not for the faint hearted… or the small-engined or those with dainty fuel tanks.
I have made the full-rez version of this photo available for APR Patrons at the $4 level and up in the 2017-01 folder of the APR Extras Dropbox site. If interested in getting this and the previous years worth of Extras, consider signing up for the APR Patreon.
I have been busy with a number of things recently (some good, some bad), which has clearly reduced my Aerospace History blogification substantially. So… here’s a cutaway of the XB-70:
Granted, it’s tiny. However, a far bigger version of this illustration, created Way Back When for “Flight” magazine, is available on the Flight archives, right HERE. From back when such bits of beauty were created by hand.
Shamelessly yanked from an XB-70 manual, a “meh” quality scan of the innards of the XB-70:
A slide found in the NASA HQ archive. It’s not spectacular image quality, but it might be of interest.
Does *anyone* know of good, high-rez, accurate and *official* layout drawings for the B-70? The best available are the Paul Matt drawings, but those aren’t “official” NAA drawings; all the NAA drawings I’ve ever come across have been pretty small and/or inconsistent. If anyone has such blueprints, I’m ready and willing to talk turkey. Please advise.
From a NASA report on the XB-70:
A photo from a NASA report showing the tail end of a B-70, with engine #3 removed. The B-70 was a carefully shaped vehicle, every line and curve designed to let the beast of a bomber cruise at Mach 3+. But the engine bay was basically just six square holes in the back that the engines were stuffed into.
At Mach 3, fairing in those gaps just wouldn’t have been worth the bother.
The October 2022 rewards are available for APR Patrons and Subscribers. This latest package includes:
Large format art: A Bell Aerospace painting of the D188A VTOL fighter/bomber
Document: “Standard Aircraft Characteristics – Convair Class VF Seaplane Night Fighter (SKATE)” diagrams and data for seaplane jet fighter
Document: “21St Century Aerospace – The 20th Century Challenge,” General Dynamics presentation, late 80’s about hypersonics/NASP. From photographs.
Document: “Prototype X-14 VTOL Aircraft,” Bell Aerospace presentation, 1971, on the “SeaKat” operational naval VTOL. From photos, but art and diagrams were also scanned for clarity.
CAD Diagram ($5 and up): XB-70 Valkyrie forward fuselage configuration
If you would like to help fund the acquisition and preservation of such things, along with getting high quality scans for yourself, please consider signing on either for the APR Patreon or the APR Monthly Historical Documents Program. Back issues are available for purchase by patrons and subscribers.
… at the National Museum of the USAF in Dayton:
Some *really* interesting things there, such as a Crossbow and an Iraqi MiG 25. A lot of restoration work is needed on some; others look about ready to display. I’d kinda like to see that MiG stripped of the Iraqi markings and restored as a Soviet version… and then parked near the SR-71/XB-70.
Note also that as the drone flies down the length of the MiG the camera pans down, eventually pointing more or less straight down. *THIS* needs to happen with planes like the SR-71, XB-70, YF-12: get me some good, clear imagery of these aircraft from above. Complete coverage, please.
Rewards have just been posted for APR Patrons/Monthly Historical Documents Program subscribers. Included:
1: “Manned Aerodynamic Reusable Spaceship (MARS) Vehicle Design” a 1962 Douglas report covering a single stage “orbital airplane” of impressive size and design.
2: “Pretest Information 3.3 Percent 624A Aerodynamic Heating Investigation, NASA Langley Unitary Plan Wind Tunnel.” A 1963 Martin report describing a test of the Titan IIIC/Dyna Soar configuration.
3: Official XB-70 General Arrangement Diagram
4: CAD diagram: a 1974 Lockheed concept for a subscale Space Shuttle Orbiter Mach 9 flight test model, to be dragged behind a YF-12C and booster by an “Avanti” rocket (modification of the D-21B’s booster) with an internal SRAM motor in the orbiter.
If this sort of thing is of interest to you, either because you’d like to obtain these documents or you’d like to help preserve aerospace history (or both) please consider signing on to either the APR Patreon or the APR Monthly Historical Documents Program.
