US Lifting Bodies Studies - START (ASSET/PRIME), FDL, X-24, etc.

It does rather look like perforated metal sheet overlaid with thin vellum paper, often what was originally drawn on for use in making cyanotype and similar process blueprints. That would explain the relative transparency of the paper; the "grating" is less obviously useful, unless it was, as suggested, some sort of vacuum table (nothing else seems to have used it) or just what happened to be available for photography. s-l160sc 0.jpg
 
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martinbayer said:
A winged ballistic capsule sounds just a little bit like a winged aerostat airship, because of unnecessary mass induced by functional redundancy.
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Concept was to meet an Air Force (note the "star-n-bars" and lettering on the hatch :) ) cross-range request. Not really sure that ever got a really good 'concept' for the idea but the general idea was to reenter with the nose and lifting surfaces rather than the capsule style reentry.

Randy
 
Late '60's FDL-9 glider from Airbreathing Hypersonic Propulsion

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finally, someone find where BGRV hidding in
USAF museum, he said the noisetip of this collection is made by depleted uranium(or depleted uranium inside the noisetip as ballast?) thus the museum deside not to display it. by the way,the last aircraft has been damaged,sad.maybe the staff didn't know how to dismantle it.

so the question is : why they use DU?
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FDL-7-esque windtunnel model from AEDC Facebook page:
Did you know… In July 1969, more than 500 hours of testing were conducted on models of a proposed maneuverable-recoverable reentry spacecraft in wind tunnels at Arnold Air Force Base.
The unmanned space vehicle was designed to reenter the atmosphere at very high speeds and make a conventional “aircraft-type” landing.
The objective of the tests was to obtain force, moment and heat transfer data on model configurations under simulated reentry flight conditions.​
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451491397_906532154832827_8629292777335571234_n.jpg 451484835_906532168166159_561521950641670753_n.jpg
 
The Artist said:
Here is the World's Fair Exhibit picture from Dyna-Soar: Hypersonic Strategic Weapons System. Additionally, I'm posting a copy of the Robert McCall painting to illustrate my above comment.
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Don't have an idea of its utility to the forum when l post this but here is a larger version of the McCall painting from tumblr.

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okakac said:
Don't have an idea of its utility to the forum when l post this but here is a larger version of the McCall painting from tumblr.

View attachment 739912
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Gotta love those crab hands! When all you have is a pair of scissors, everything looks like a piece of paper... Also, going in on that poor antenna with full gusto with the backpack pushing for full efficiency! But then again, his buddy is giving the lifting body RCS a good workout as well...
 
..that time NASA forgot what a MURP was (~from Johnson Space Centre's Aug '84 Space News Roundup):

What's a MURP?​
In the course of preparing a history of the Space Shuttle Orbital Flight Test Program, Rice University Historians Joe Guilmartin and John Mauer have come across an acronym which so far defies decoding. The acronym is MURP, and apparently it refers to a reusable space-craft design considered by the Shuttle task force in the late 1960s.
'We have looked high and low for evidence of what MURP stands for" Guilmartin said, "but so far we haven't found it." The historians ask anyone with knowledge or documentation of the acronym to please contact them at x2838.​
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MURP - Manned Upper-stage Reusable Payload. The crewed vehicle to the SERV (Single-stage Earth-Orbital Reusable Vehicle), developed by the Chrysler Space Division.
 

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Dew said:
..and these of course:
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"Research staff", including one R. Dale Reed (rear left, wearing tie), father of the Lifting Body concept at NASA and initiator of just about every US Lifting Body study (for which this thread is named) of the era.

Sometimes we run out of things for the summer interns to do and let them write captions. :)
 
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overscan (PaulMM) said:
Probably Martin X-24C
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I actually have one of these that was used at the Langley Research wind tunnel that was given to me as a gift from my neighbor who had just retired after 40 years of service there. It was charred black when I got it and after days of polishing it, it’s as shiny as a mirror. It weighs about 10 pounds and is like a brick.
 
antigravite said:
It may refer to the X-24B but I have not been able to determine this.
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I think you maybe can now ! :

X-24B.jpg
from..
Office of Advanced Manned Vehicles.jpg

Group lot of early Space Shuttle insignia design sketches from the Office of Advanced Manned Vehicles at the Air Force Flight Test Center (AFFTC), accomplished in graphite, ink, and colored felt tip on a set of three off-white sheets ranging in size from 11 x 14 to 17 x 14, featuring a total of 16 preliminary insignia designs for the Space Shuttle program, the Orbiter spacecraft, and the Advanced Manned Vehicles office located at the AFFTC at the Edwards Air Force Base. Included with sketches is an assortment of Shuttle-related paperwork from the Advanced Manned Vehicles office, which includes notes, agendas, overview packets, results sheets, and two stapled reports headed “Test Support Flying Hours,” dated April 1984. In overall fine condition. From the estate of Col. Richard M. Cooper.​
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taken from this listing
 
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George Kenyon, NASA aerodynamicist, with three 'finned' M2-F1 (Alfred Eggers on right in second photo)
 

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