Conroy Giant Cargo Aircraft Projects Colossus & Virtus

Orionblamblam

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The Houston AIAA section has published a 4-page article I put together on the Conroy "Virtus," a twin-fuselage heavy lift aircraft built from B-52 parts meant to serve as the Space Shuttle Carrier Aircraft. You can download it (in the March/April 2012 issue of Horizons) for free here:
http://www.aiaa-houston.org/Newsletter.aspx
 

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Re: Conroy "Virtus" Article

...seems the aiaa-houston.org site is not working :(
 
Re: Conroy "Virtus" Article

Scott, do you know why I have the Virtus listed under "Rockwell International"?
 
Re: Conroy "Virtus" Article

How about since the Shuttle was Rockwell & the Virtus was intended as its carrier?
 
Artist's impression of Conroy Colossus a modification of the Canadair CL-44.
Conroy Colossus!
The world's largest commercial cargo aircraft will be constructed by Conroy Aircraft of Santa Barbara, Calif. Capable of carrying a payload of 65,000 lbs., the aircraft will have a cargo compartment 25 ft. 6 in. high, 25 ft. 2 in. wide and 113 ft. 2 in. long. A larger version of the company's previous modification of a Canadair CL-44, the Colossus is designed to transport airbus components and space hardware.

Source:
http://www.allaboutguppys.com/
 

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Conroy Colossus Giant Cargo Aircraft

Hi to all!

The Conroy Colossus was meant to be a development of the shuttle carrier Conroy Virtus. It is a very misterious and large project, and I want to join efforts to find images and information about this project. I have plans to make a scale model of it, so let's do it! The only image I have I found here on this forum. Please check in attach.
 

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Agreed! Conroy Collossus looks like it was based upon the same Canadair Yukon/Britannia airframe as some of his earlier Guppies." It would need much larger tail surfaces to fly straight.
 
Speaking of tail surfaces...did anyone do a ventral tailfin that hinged up to be a ramp? Double tail closes like a door...ground crew inserts heavy stiffening bars not used in flight.
 
The configuration in #16 looks rather familiar. Convergent evolution ??
 
That's a totally different plane from the Conroy Colossus! The Conroy plane was just a bigger Guppy!

I never put the study on eBay because Covid hit and that was the end of my selling days (for awhile at least).
Available evidence says otherwise (see reply #9, for one, and the fact that the three-view referenced in the aerospaceprojectsreview.com link calls it "Colossus" *twice.*). If you have contradictory evidence, we're all ears. reply #8 shows a somewhat earlier Conroy concept also called "Colossus." It may well be that Conroy used the name twice. The later larger design was under the Turbo Three Corporation, a later iteration of Conroy's enterprise.
 

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That's a totally different plane from the Conroy Colossus! The Conroy plane was just a bigger Guppy!

I never put the study on eBay because Covid hit and that was the end of my selling days (for awhile at least).
Available evidence says otherwise (see reply #9, for one, and the fact that the three-view referenced in the aerospaceprojectsreview.com link calls it "Colossus" *twice.*). If you have contradictory evidence, we're all ears. reply #8 shows a somewhat earlier Conroy concept also called "Colossus." It may well be that Conroy used the name twice. The later larger design was under the Turbo Three Corporation, a later iteration of Conroy's enterprise.
I do have evidence but I haven't taken photos of it yet. The Conroy plane I have looks just like a super-huge Guppy.

The plans for the one I have is from Strato Engineering and it's dated 1971.
 
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