Navy/Boeing Recoverable Test Vehicle (RTV) (1988)

donnage99

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From the website, it's said to be Reusable Test Vehicle, which is generic enough that nothing useful showed up on google. Anyone got additional information on this, or know what it is?
 

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Could this be a clue?

Fiedler et al in U.S. Pat. No. 3,075,301 disclose a reusable test vehicle design involving a dummy missile for underwater launcher check-out, underwater missile trajectory testing, and personnel training. This system is principally concerned with providing a vehicle which is capable of eliminating fallback and the inherent danger of launcher damage.


Source: Undersea vehicle ejection from capsules
United States Patent 5542333

http://www.freepatentsonline.com/5542333.html
 
This time it's called Recoverable Test Vehicle lol.
http://www.chinalakealumni.org/IMAGES/2000/Recoverable%20Test%20Vehicle%2028JUL00%2009NMAT.JPG
 

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On this page, it is described as follows:

RTV Recoverable Test Vehicle (T&E tool; not a weapon)

Since it's an index from the China Lake Museum, I guess it can be trusted... but what does T&E mean?
 
The Recoverable Test Vehicle


Clearly there is a need to improve efficiency and effectiveness
in tlie weapon system development process.
Achieving such improvements is the principal objective of
the Navy's RTV being developed under contract by the
Boeing Aerospace Company. The RTV is an aerodynamically
efficient glide vehicle to be used as a flight test-bed for
evaluating weapon components and concepts. The vehicle
will be configured with a research interior and appropriate
interfaces to enable weapon system components to he integrated
and subjected to real-time flight dynamics. At the
conclusion of the test flight the vehicle will deploy a recovery
parachute for "soft-recovery" of tlie vehicle and its
payload to facilitate post-flight payload data collection and
performance analysis. The recovery technique will permit
both tlie vehicle and prototype hardware being tested to he
reused, thereby, producing major development and test cost
savings.
The RTV itself will be flight-worthy and certified for
captive carry and ejection from tactical aircraft. Since it will
enclose developmental hardware and associated software, the
components being evaluated will not need to be flight certified.


Brassboard hardware can be taken from tlie laboratory
and, with little effort, be integrated into the RTV, flown, and
evaluated in environments representative of the intended
operational mission. The RTV will provide sufficient interior
space to permit side-by-side evaluation of competing
components under identical flight conditions.
The RTV will be operated by the Naval Weapons Center
(NWC), China Lake, California.

Recoverable test vehicle - An innovative approach to risk reduction
M. BARTLETT, U.S. Navy, Naval Air Systems Command, Washington, DC
Chapter DOI: 10.2514/6.1988-524
Publication Date: 11 January 1988 - 14 January 1988
 

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From some place on teh intarweb:
" Comments. The Director stated that the draft report was incorrect in stating that the JSOW program did not plan to use prototyping in Demonstration and Validation. Specifically, the JSOW program office planned an appropriate amount of component prototyping using the Recoverable Test Vehicle Program. When the Recoverable Test Vehicle Program ran into difficulties, the JSOW program office coordinated with the three Demonstration and Validation contractors to modify their plans to include prototyping. These contractors used their own funds to develop and demonstrate the maturity of their systems. If the JSOW program office had contracted for three independent prototyping efforts, the cost and schedule impact on the program would have been an additional $64 million and a delay of 2 years."

"When USD(A&T) approved the JSOW acquisition strategy for Demonstration and Validation, USD(A&T) assumed that a Recoverable Test Vehicle being developed in a separate Navy program would be used to support captive flight testing of airframe hardware approximating the planned JSOW configuration. This test support never occurred because the Recoverable Test Vehicle Program encountered technical and financial difficulties and the vehicle was not available to support the JSOW effort."


This thread makes me feel like a CHAMPion.
 
Earlier in the same document...

When USD(A&T) approved the JSOW acquisition strategy for Demonstration and Validation, USD(A&T) assumed that a Recoverable Test Vehicle being developed in a separate Navy program would be used to support captive flight testing of airframe hardware approximating the planned JSOW configuration.
This test support never occurred because the Recoverable Test Vehicle Program encountered technical and financial difficulties and the vehicle was not available to support the JSOW effort. Subsequently, the competing contractors each decided to pursue prototyping activities outside of the contracts. The JSOW Program Office then modified the Demonstration and Validation contracts in September 1990 to provide for receipt of test data from the contractors, allow use of Government facilities for testing dispenser (launch and release mechanisms), and fund testing and analysis of composite materials for the nose and fins of the JSOW vehicle.
 
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We had 3 test flights before they canceled the project.
On the first flight, the lateral accelerometer polarity was reversed and it went into a flat spin and landed in the mountains.
On the second flight it flew successfully although the control system performance was poor. The yaw axis had a mild spiral mode instability at higher AOA, which I fixed with a control system redesign.
The third flight was completely successful, with the remote pilot saying it flew very nicely.
It was expensive to repair the scratches it suffered after each landing (on its back) and re-qualifying it for captive carry again on the A-7. We had no customers by that time so it was scrapped, but it had an impressive lift to drag ratio, and range when dropped from 40,000 feet.
A fun project to work on. It used the same data link as the QF-4 for control and telemetry.
 

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