Jan 13 1965
From The Space Library
X-15 No. 3 flown by NASA pilot Milton O. Thompson to maximum altitude of 99,400 ft. and maximum speed of 3,712 mph (mach 5.48) . Purpose of the flight was to collect air flow data and record measurements of skin friction on the aircraft's surface. (NASA X-15 Proj. Off.; FRC Release; X-15 Flight Log)
NASA launched a two part 99-lb. sounding rocket payload from NASA Wallops Station which reached an altitude of 614 mi. but did not separate in flight as planned. Launched on a four-stage Javelin (Argo D-4) and designed as "mother-daughter" experiment, the payload was to separate into two sections at about 170-mi, altitude with radio signals to be sent from daughter to mother as they continued to rise separately. The technique was devised to provide more accurate profiles of electron density in the upper atmosphere. Telemetry data would be analyzed to determine why the sections did not separate. (Wallops Release 65-3; NASA Rpt. SRL)
NASA successfully launched an Aerobee 150A sounding rocket to peak altitude of 110 mi. from Wallops Island, Va., with instrumented payload to measure the ultraviolet and visible light emitted from the earth's atmosphere between 37 mi. and 125 mi. An Attitude Control System (ACS) was also flown. Good spectral data were collected. (NASA Rpt. SRL)
Reported that NASA Administrator James E. Webb had ruled against a protest by a group of NASA astronauts of the NASA decision to limit the first manned Gemini flight to three orbits. The astronauts had requested that the GT-3 flight should be "open-end," leaving it to the astronauts as to whether they should go for three or even 30 orbits. (Macomber, Copley News Service, San Diego Union, 1/13/65)
XC-142A V/Stol, flown by Ling-Temco-Vought test pilots John Konrad and Stuart Madison, made a flawless first transition flight. The transport aircraft took off like a helicopter, adjusted its wings for conventional flight, and then circled the field, reversed the process, and made a vertical landing. The XC-142A's first transition flight came only six flights after its initial hover flight on Dec. 29, 1964. It was the Nation's first V/Stol built for operational evaluation rather than research. (AP, CSM, 1/13/65)
NASA Langley Research Center scientists Harry W. Carlson and Francis E. McLean said that for the first time there was hope for a significant reduction in the sonic booms expected from proposed supersonic airliners. A plane flying faster than the speed of sound compresses the air around it into shock waves trailing from the nose, wings, engine inlets, tail, and any other protuberances. Near the plane there would be separate waves, producing "near field effects." Traced on a graph to show changes in pressure, the waves would make a jagged line resembling the letter "N." As the waves traveled toward the ground, they would coalesce into two powerful waves-one appearing to trail from the nose and one from the tail-producing "far-field effects" also shaped as a letter "N" in terms of pressure patterns. The sharp peaks of this N-shaped wave were suspected of causing most of the annoyance and structural damage possible from sonic booms. Carlson and McLean discovered that planes the length and shape of supersonic airliner designs would not fly far enough away from the earth for their far-field effects to be felt on the ground, leaving only the less bothersome near-field effect to be taken into account. It was hoped that this new finding would mean that designs currently submitted to the Government in the design competition for supersonic transport, or minor refinements of them, would fit within Government-imposed sonic boom limitations and that still further improvement through design changes would bring further decreases in the boom. Dr. Floyd L. Thompson, LaRC Director, called what had been learned "significant new knowledge" and said it could, under the best of circumstances, "have great significance." He pointed out that the best of circumstances were seldom found in designing an airplane-particularly the supersonic transport, which he said was "at least as sophisticated technically as the Apollo." (Clark, NYT, 1/14/65, 1, 12)
DOD announced that during the next six months 150 ICBMs scheduled for deactivation (27 Atlas E, 69 Atlas F, and 54 Titan I missiles) would be put into storage at Norton AFB, Calif. Some of these missiles would be used eventually as spacecraft boosters, others would be employed in the Nike-X program. They would be replaced by the more advanced Minuteman ICBMs, of which a total of 1,000 were authorized by Congress. It had cost almost $1 million a year to keep each of the older ICBMs combat-ready, as compared to $100,000 a year for each Minuteman. (Sehlstedt, Balt. Sun, 1/14/65; A&A, 1/65, 92)
Dr. John C. Eward, Deputy Associate Director for Research at NASA Lewis Research Center, discussed possible propulsion systems for future space-flight beyond the moon before the Conference on Civilian and Military Uses of Aerospace sponsored by the New York Academy of Sciences. He cited a manned Mars project as a prime example of a mission that could be performed by a number of different propulsion concepts. For example, manned trips by chemical rockets would be weight-restricted, but chemical rocket systems would have the advantage of having been extensively flight-tested on many other missions. Although the reactor for planned nuclear propulsion systems had only been ground tested, evaluations of complete nuclear rocket engine systems were expected within the next few years. Electric propulsion systems for manned spaceflight were even further in the future and might not be ready by 1980; but by then the mission capability of the nuclear rocket would have been so thoroughly demonstrated that it would be more attractive than chemical engines for those missions requiring increased propulsion capability. Even further into the future were nuclear systems such as the gaseous-core cavity reactor which would yield higher performance. (LRC Release 65-5)
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