A Visit To The Skunk Works

This Steven Trible story reminds me of when I was in Air Force ROTC. I went on a trip to Wright Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio. As part of the visit we had a tour of the Foreign Technology Division (FTD). As we toured the facility at the height of the Cold War, a person preceded us through the halls ringing a bell, you could see people closing up work as we passed keeping the secrets safe...at least from our prying eyes. It was a fascinating peak into a world that I had no clue (at that time) about.

To aviation aficionados the Lockheed Skunk Works founded by the legendary Kelly Johnson has always held a certain fascination. I'm sure Mr. Tremble had the time of aviation loving life there.

PALMDALE, Calif. -- I suppose getting invited to enter Skunk Works shouldn't make much sense. The secret-squirrel types like it that way. You can ask the public relations office repeatedly for several years, as I did, for a site visit, and get nowhere. Then one day you ask for a phone interview about a semi-obscure project, and -- voila! -- they ask you to come to Palmdale to see it in the hangar. If the Skunk Works organization has a motto, it should be: "Don't call us, we'll call you. ... Really, don't call us."
Actually getting inside the Skunk Works site is fairly straightforward. There's a "visitor control" building, which also includes a bank and Palmdale's coolest gift shop. I gave the clerk my driver's license and she gave me a visitor badge. The PR representative met me outside the door, and we drove inside the sprawling complex. Lockheed used to build the L-1011 Tristar here. Skunk Works arrived only in 1994, relocated to the desert from Burbank.

I had come to see the Advanced Composite Cargo Aircraft (ACCA), and interview the program manager. On paper, this is a project with enormous significance to the future of aerospace manufacturing, but I'll post more about that later. The aircraft I saw inside the hangar is a Fairchild Dornier 328Jet modified with a widened, mid- and aft-fuselage and all-new vertical tail. It is about to receive an X-plane designation from the Air Force Material Command as the next aircraft in the long-dormant XC-series for experimental cargo planes.

Walking around a Skunk Works hangar can be tricky. You never know what you might see. As we turned to leave, I looked up at a makeshift wall dividing the hangar. Just over the 30ft-tall barrier, I could clearly see the bulbous top of an enormous aircraft. It could only be one thing. "Hey, that's the P791!" I said. A worried look crossed the unfailingly polite program manager's face. "Is he supposed to see that?" he asked the PR rep. She assured him it was okay. He smirked at me and said, "We might not have let you leave." I decided to interpret this as a joke, and laughed...

Go read the rest HERE

I've Got Friends In Low Places

I'm sure the safety nazis just love this video.

NSFW...gratuitous swearing included in this at no extra charge. If you are around sensitive ears I would suggest muting the audio...but you'll miss out on the Ozzy soundtrack as well. Yeah, it's a trade-off.

What The Captain Means...

Via Thunder Tales and Ed Rasimus.

If you have an interest in the air war over Vietnam, check out Ed's books; Palace Cobra and When Thunder Rolled. They are both well worth your time.


The more things change the more they stay the same.

WARNING!

The following video contains some adult language viewer discretion is advised.

A Jet Going Really Fast

This is what happens when an object flies very close to the speed of sound...pretty cool that F-18F demo. This is from the F-18E/F Super Hornet flight demo practice session at Alliance Airport on Friday the 10th of OCT, alas the weekend performances were much less dramatic.

Doesn't Anyone Remember Anything?

This POST at Wired Magazine's Danger Room tells the story of the USAF launching a High Speed Anti Radiation Missile (HARM) (it's a missile used to defeat surface to air missile guidance radars) from a drone F-4.

In the article they said:

Armed Predator and Reaper drones have become the primary weapons in the fight against Pakistani militants. But they can be pricey; the Reapers come in at around a hundred million dollars each. Which is why the Air Force is working on a cheaper option: killer zombies.

That reminded me of something I had read a few years ago about the Ryan Firebee family of drones...

Attack and Multimission RPVs: BGM-34A/B/C
In the late 1960s, the Navy studied the possibility to convert the BQM-34A Firebee target drone to a remote-controlled anti-ship missile. In several test flights, BQM-34As equipped with a TV system in the nose, were successfully flown by remote "pilots" watching the TV image. Precision low-level flight above the sea was made possible by the Ryan-developed RALACS (Radar Altimeter Low Altitude Control System). In September 1971, successful tests of Model 248 missiles (called "BQM/SSM") against ship targets showed the validity of the basic concept, but the project was terminated due to lack of funding.

In the same year, the USAF showed interest in a development of the Firebee I to be used for enemy air-defense suppression, because of the high loss rate in these missions. In March 1971, Teledyne Ryan received a contract to convert four Model 147S drones to BGM-34A (Model 234) configuration. Like the Navy's BQM/SSM, the BGM-34A was piloted by an operator watching a TV image transmitted from the drone's nose. In tests during 1971/72, the BGM-34As successfully launched AGM-65 Maverick air-to-surface missiles and electro-optically guided glide bombs against simulated SAM sites. Interestingly, almost 30 years later a firing of an AGM-114 Hellfire missile by an MQ-1L Predator UAV was much hyped as a breakthrough in armed UAV technology.

Following the successful BGM-34A tests, Teledyne Ryan developed the BGM-34B (Model 234A) operational strike RPV. This featured the higher-rated J69-T-41A engine, a modified tail, larger control surfaces, and improved operational capabilities. Eight BGM-34Bs were built, and tested in 1973/74. The tests included the modification of some of the drones with a new nose containing a LLLTV (Low Light Level Television) camera and a laser designator, to act as a "pathfinder" for weapon-carrying RPVs.

Yeah, you read that right it said late 1960's and then tested in the early to mid 70's. For those of you scoring at home that's over 30 years ago. The USAF lost interest in UAVs, and drones for much of anything other than targets in the intervening years. And now what's old is new again...only a lot more expensive.

In November 1974, the USAF had three different versions of Firebee combat RPVs in various development states: the AQM-34M reconnaissance drone, the AQM-34V ECM drone, and the BGM-34B strike RPV. It was decided to develop a single multi-mission RPV variant, designated BGM-34C (Teledyne Ryan Model 259), combing the capabilities of the three versions. Five YAQM-34Us were converted to BGM-34Cs, and these were flight-tested between September 1976 and April 1978. There were three exchangable nose sections for the BGM-34C, optimized for the reconnaissance, ECM, and strike roles. Although the tests were considered successful, no funds were approved for follow-on orders for production vehicles. This was at least in part caused by the general view of some Air Force officials, who saw the RPVs as a "competition" to the conventional manned aircraft.

Surprise, surprise. And now here we sit with the USAF saying they can't buy enough planes and the ones they have are too old...with not enough money to go around. Yeah, hindsight is 20/20, but at least some people saw this one coming.

What's 30 million here or there...

...or how to get rid of a F-117 without really trying.



This is what they are going to do with all remaining F-117 Nighthawks, a few years ago the pride of the USAF and America. Up until a few months ago security guards at airshows wouldn't let you near it. WOW.

The story is HERE. I think Ben Rich and Kelly Johnson just rolled over in their graves.

Picture of the Day

Pretty cool picture of an F-16 re-fueling somewhere over Iraq.


Swiped from BlackFive

I know I've been light on the posting lately, but I do actually work for a living from time to time...my apologies.

F-35 = F-105

Oh yeah, I can see it definitely.

Is the new F-35 currently under development actually a new age F-105?

That's the question that is asked HERE.

Here's a taste...

Where does the F-35 / F-105 comparison come close? Those that believe there is a comparison say weight and wing-loading: Lots of it when you load up the F-35 design. Yet there are some other comparisons: Long development time. For the F-105, a very long way to get from the drawing board to operational capability. And like the F-35, an over-sell in it's ability. Here early fielding of the F-105 chalked up 125 maintenance man-hours per flight hour because of all of the untried Buck Rogers avionics. Today, the F-35 is a long way from proving it is easier to maintain than an F-16.

Personally I don't know, I flunked out of engineering school and I'm not an experimental test pilot, so I will refrain from passing judgement on an F-35s manuverability based on the way it looks. Secondly what aircraft being made today doesn't have a long development time? Go back in time and look at the development period for the F-15. It's not like we are making P-51s that go from a drawing to production in less than a year anymore. These are expensive complicated projects that take billions (that's right BILLIONS) of dollars and thousands of people to design and build them.

But I guess it's nice to speculate and since it's (F-35) coming whether we like it or not, hope for its failure...so they can be right and say, "I TOLD YOU SO."

And as one of the commenters stated you could do a lot worse than have a legacy like the F-105.

Hark an Aardvark!

I have a good friend who flew the F-111 until the types' premature retirement. Considering what they were trying to accomplish in the '60s this jet was quite the feat of engineering. Unfortunately quite a few jets and people were lost trying to work the bugs out.

A Starfighter

Do youreself a favor and just mute the sound on this...good work on the video (if you can ignore the flipped image from time to time), but the music is, let's just say not my taste.

The F-104 was to me the coolest looking jet I could ever imagine. Unfortunately by most accounts it was fast as hell but not much else. But it LOOKED GOOD, and sometimes that's all that matters.

A Hustler

When I was but a wee lad, General Dynamics opened a plant in Waco, TX at the former James Connally AFB where they did modifications on the F-111 fighter bomber and they brought every B-58 through there enroute to the boneyard at Davis Monthan AFB, AZ. A while back going through all the junk my mom saved from my childhood, I found a clipping from the Waco paper that showed the last B-58 leaving for the boneyard. What an awesome looking jet.

Huh?

From Lt. Nixon over at C.H.U.D. Busters comes the kind of thing you have to go to the West Coast for...

The "Blue Angels of Death" are precision-strike fighter killing machines and the aerobatics shows are military psychological war dressed up as breathtaking-eardrum shattering technical bravado to whip up patriotic support for u.s.global war-making and slaughtering.

...apparently someone has issues with the US Navy Flight Demonstration Squadron. I guess they don't take her breath away. Maybe because they operate too close to the danger zone. Maybe she would like it better if she was playin with the boys.

I for one congratulate them on the choice of a new edgy name designed to attract a wider, more risk taking audience...The Blue Angles of Death!

UPDATE!

Upon further consideration, I have come to the decision that an even better name would be the Blue Angels of the Apocalypse. You can have that one free Navy...you're welcome.

This is Maverick Requesting a Fly-By

It's almost football season, and what's a National Anthem, without a fly-by?

See NFL Network's story about fly-bys HERE. Good stuff.

It's Never A Bad Time For Some VH

An oldie but goodie...Van Halen's Dreams, featuring the US Navy's Blue Angles.



And the F-18 version done by gv5585 over at YouTube

Video of the F-35B

Here (via Ares Homepage and Lockheed Martin) is some video of the first flight of the F-35B over North Texas. It struck me while watching this, that aerospace companies used to get bonuses for going supersonic on the first flight etc. These days they don't even retract the landing gear.

The First Flight of the F-35B

Back before I was born, these type of events happened every few months...for a lover of aviation that must have been an interesting (yet dangerous) time.

From Aerospace Daily comes this:

Lockheed Martin has flown the first short-take-off-and- vertical-landing (STOVL) F-35B, in conventional-take-off (CTOL) mode, clearing the way for funding to be released for production of the first six U.S. Marine Corps aircraft.

The 44-minute flight of aircraft BF-1, the first production-representive F-35, from Lockheed’s Fort Worth, Texas, plant also marked the start of a five-year, 5,000-plus test program involving three variants of the Joint Strike Fighter: the CTOL F-35A, STOVL F-35B and aircraft carrier-capable F-35C.

F-35B lead test pilot Graham Tomlinson, from JSF industrial partner BAE Systems, says the first flight went “absolutely to plan.” Flight-testing is beginning in CTOL mode, with STOVL testing now scheduled to begin in the first quarter of 2009.

The aircraft was flown with gear down at speeds up to 230 knots and 15,000 feet altitude to assess handling qualities. The gear will be retracted on the second flight. Tomlinson says BF-1 flies “very similarly” to aircraft AA-1, the first F-35, with some enhancing features, including dual nose-gear doors to improve directional stability and improved flight control on touchdown. “The aircraft lands itself,” he says.

First flight of BF-1 is one of two milestones required for the award of a $1.3 billion contract for the first six low-rate-initial-production F-35Bs. Marine Brig. Gen. David Heinz, deputy head of the Joint Strike Fighter program office, says the contract should be awarded after Pentagon acquisition chief John Young has been briefed on resolution of blade-failure issues with the STOVL version of Pratt & Whitney’s F135 engine.

Despite the engine problems, the first flight was within weeks of the late May date committed to in August 2006, Heinz says. Although a delay of 30 to 60 days had been predicted after turbine blade failures in two STOVL F135s during ground testing in 2007, “we came in two weeks in front of that,” he says.

For the rest please go HERE

Strike Eagle Pron

Here's some shots of the F-15E demo bird I shot at the Tyndall AFB, FL air show in 2006.

You see the USAF is good for something after all.

Thud To Fly Again?

Hands down this is my favorite Vietnam era aircraft.

Now it appears that someone wants to make one flyable again. That would be an awesome sight, but I can imagine spares and maintenance would be a real bitch.

I got the following via e-mail

The Collings Foundation can be seen HERE

Collings Foundation is a 501 (3) with some 40,000 donators. They collect, restore, maintain and fly vintage aircraft at air shows. They are a class act. One part of Collings is the Vietnam Memorial Flight currently consisting of an F-4D, TA-4J, and HU-1. Another is their Wings of Freedom Tour flying B-17, B-24, B-25 and P-51.It took them four years to work through the Air Force and AF Museum at Wright Patterson bureaucracy to get an F-4 Phantom II. It is the only civilian owned F-4 flying today in the world. There was and is no cost to the government to get, rehab and fly the F-4. It's fully funded by the Collings Foundation.

I've been asked by Bob Collings to help them get a F-105 Thud. Scattered around the country, mostly outside on static display, pedestals, et al, the Air Force has about a hundred F-105s, 96 non airworthy. Most are deteriorating due to weather and exposure. Collings Foundation would pay all cost to get a Thud, to get an engine, to rehab it to flyable condition, and the cost to fly it. Not one penny of government funds involved. When trying to get the F-4 excuses like liability, et al were used. None of the military / AF Museum arguments against letting go of an F-4 have become problems.

For all veterans of our era, to see a thud fly again would be a thrill; would be a living memorial. And it would be special memorial to the hundreds killed in the Thud, to we POW Thud drivers, and to all who flew and maintained it. According to Bob Collings (neat guy), a word from the Republican ranking member of the Senate Armed Forces committee would do wonders to shake loose just one F-105. I see no down side, but think there would be upside to John from the veteran Vietnam era community. I'm trying to get this letter to John McCain should know soon if it gets to him (he seems busy lately!) As a Thud Weasel guy, Bob Collings (Collings Foundation) asked me to help contact the F-105 community.

I'm sending this the Wild Weasel Society, River Rats and drop it into the NAMPOW listserve. I assume most Vietnam vets, and all Thud drivers / maintainers would support seeing a Thud fly again. Any and all support you can help with is great. Bob said to contact him for as much detail as you want or need to help get the ball rolling. The web site is on top of this doc, his email info@collingsfoundation.org.

Another Fly-By...

This was at a TCU-NAVY game. Note the tail hook and the aircraft manuvering around the scoreboard. I've seen one lower but it was at an actual airfield not a football stadium.



Via Air Warriors

F-111 (1) Crappy Building (0)

This is what happens when an Aardvark blows past around Mach 1.

ENJOY!