Graham Warwick/WASHINGTON DC
A massive cargo airship, a flying-wing airliner and a low-cost supersonic engine are the three projects chosen by NASA to jump-start a new programme to accelerate development of promising new aeronautical technologies.
The Revolutionary Concepts (RevCon) programme will fund early flight testing of advanced technologies using "low-cost X-planes", says acting project manager Jerry Malcolm. Three "quick start" projects have been selected to launch the programme:
• AeroCraft - a piloted, 7.8%-scale model of a Lockheed Martin Skunk Works' design for a 255m (835 ft)-long cargo airship. Flight tests are planned for 2001 at NASA Dryden, California, under a $10 million cost-sharing contract;
• Blended Wing Body (BWB) - an unmanned, 14.3%-scale model of a Boeing Phantom Works design for a 400- to 500-passenger flying wing airliner. The RevCon programme will contribute $1.5 million, with flight tests planned for early 2002 at Dryden;
• Pulse Detonation Engine - a jet engine with no turbomachinery, capable of operating from zero airspeed to Mach 3. The programme will provide $9.6 million for live-fire tests of a missile-scale engine at M3, attached to a Lockheed SR-71 operating out of Dryden, in 2002.
NASA has invited proposals for the next batch of concepts to be funded. Malcolm says six will be selected for Phase 1 feasibility study contracts beginning in November. Next July, he says, these will be narrowed to "two or three" for cost-sharing demonstration contracts beginning a year from now and leading to flight experiments within two to three years. New concepts will be selected every two-three years, Malcolm says.
Malcolm says the 18.3m-long AeroCraft will investigate aeroelasticity and controllability issues with the Skunk Works' design for a pressure-stabilised, partially buoyant airship. A full-scale vehicle would weigh almost 1.4 million tonnes and carry over 450,000t of cargo.
The tailless, 10.7m-span BWB model will be "dynamically scaled" to investigate low-speed flight control "at the edge of the envelope", he says. The remotely piloted vehicle will have three 200lb (0.9kN) thrust Williams engines.
Source: Flight International
