Dec 252009
A Boeing graphic from 1978 showing several different approaches to the idea of using shockwaves from one part of an aircraft to increase lift and/or cancel out other shockwaves and decrease drag. Notice the “Busemann Biplane” in lower left… silly as it may look, a straight-winged biplane can have surprisingly low supersonic drag due to favorable shock interactions. The big problem is that such configurations are usually pretty sensitive to flight conditions… if they are optimised for, say, Mach 4.5 and 80,000 feet, if you fly at 80,000 feet and Mach 4.2, your range might drop by half.
The flat top wing/body is seriously old (as is the Busemann Biplane), having been generated at the NACA in the late 1950s.
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