Nov 152016
 

Boom Technology, a company working towards a supersonic passenger transport, is unveiling in Denver the mockup of their “XB-1,” a 1/3 scale technology demonstrator.

A supersonic jet faster than the Concorde will get public design debut in Centennial

See the link above for some hugenormous photos, but here’s what the thing looks like:
xb-1-b

xb-1-a

To me the XB-1 looks like the Rose Mach Buster and a T-38 got a little drunk and made the plane with two backs, then slathered the baby with Bondo and sanded real, real smooth.

Boom Technology is working towards a commercial SST with a cruise speed of Mach 2.2, 44 passengers and transAtlantic range. They are hoping to reduce sonic boom to levels low enough that the FAA will let them fly overland, but as the law is currently written I don’t think they could legally do it if their plane was utterly silent. Getting the bureaucrats and politicians to change the regulations that stifle progress is probably a much bigger chore than designing a supersonic jet that’s actually commercially viable.

 Posted by at 1:18 pm