Posted on 08/05/2016 3:44:04 AM PDT by sukhoi-30mki
You’re a lot of fun! Do you really think that there’s any way of pumping ballast fast enough to compensate for tons of missile leaving within a second or two?
Releasing the Shuttle - a large glider - was never done except in some Bruce Willis movie. As it is that 747 variant used to transport the shuttle had twin tails to provide yaw authority when the Shuttle’s bulk would have blanked out the stock single tail.
No, launching any missile at all would be accomplished by only two methods; gas generator expulsion before main engine ignition (like the Polaris/Poseidon/ Trident/ss-20/25) which conceivably could push the missile way from the airframe without hitting the tail but that system would impart huge recoil forces on the 747 aft fuselage. No way, Jose.
Or, the missile’s motor is ignited to propel it away. Nah. If a multi ton missile is fired, it either accelerates relatively slowly at first - hitting the tail for sure - or it has enormous acceleration with lots of motor energy which keeps going as it exits the vertical launch tube. The exhaust gases and debris would wreck the fuselage and tail.
Hope you’re not planning on flying that thing..
That’s the big problem we have in the defense R&D these days - engineers without any military experience combined with marketing guys with zero engineering training.
That’s the big problem we have in the defense R&D these days - engineers without any military experience combined with marketing guys with zero engineering training.
Due to your obvious lack of knowledge in this area, I will you leave with this information and then retire from this conversation.
There were 5 (count them 5) Approach and Landing Tests (ALT) starting in August 1977 and ending in October 77.
You can see a video of one of them below, and I can assure you this wasn’t a Bruce Willis movie since I was at Dryden for two of these.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cOmemZl4k1U
These five were preceded by 8 flight tests (4 inert and 4 active) without a release.
I do find it amusing that you can spend a couple of minutes reading an article and looking at a couple of pencil drawings and decide that Orbital ATK, with over 12,000 employees, developer/builder of the Cygnus cargo ship presently being used to supply the ISS, and tasked by NASA with building the new SRBs for the SLS, doesn’t know as much about rockets as you do.
And as far as aircraft, they’re also the developer of the Stargazer, an L-1011 Tristar, used to launch over 35 Pegasus rockets with payloads into orbit since 1994. So I would say they have a little more experience launching rockets from aircraft than you do.
And as far as the military experience you don’t think they have - (This from Wikipedia) The Defense Systems Group, a division of Orbital ATK, and based in the Baltimore, Maryland area, produces tactical missiles, defense electronics, and medium- and large-caliber ammunition. The division also produces fuzing and warheads for both tactical missiles and munitions; precision metal and composite structures for medium and large-caliber ammunition, military aircraft, ground vehicles, and missile systems; load, assembly, and pack (LAP) of medium caliber munitions; and propellants and powders for the canister and commercial markets.
But of course you know so much more than they do.
I have no doubt that when the big one comes any civilian aircraft in the US will be subject to potential use by the military.
Easy, big fella! There’s a big difference between releasing a huge glider from a 747 (though that was amazing) and lighting the candle in the process.
Launching large rockets from the center of the fuselage is a much bigger deal. Unlike you, I have extensive experience in rockets and ballistics as an engineer.
I have also had unfavorable dealings with ATK Alliant Techsystems; they responded to our request for proposal for a stand-alone 120mm mortar with a six barrel monstrosity with a price tag that was 4 times our ceiling. Then they got nasty when we rejected it and went with our own successful design. One look at their XM25 beast ought to at least shake your faith in their “military experience”.
By military experience, I don’t mean experience selling stuff to the armed forces. I mean experience in the services, preferably combat experience. Most Beltway bandits have plenty of eager young engineers just not many of them who have any grounding in the realities of warfare.
Whoever drew that cartoon of the 747 with missile bays wasn’t the sharpest tack in the drawer.
Unlike you, I have extensive experience in rockets and ballistics as an engineer.
You just keep making assumptions like that.
4 years working for the DOD as a contract troubleshooter with both Lear Siegler and Qualitron-Aero.
10 years working for NASA on the Shuttle at JSC.
Then you, if anyone, should have seen a problem or two with this goofy design.
Please include me in the back and forth, if it continues, this has been interesting!
Deal!
BTW, the Ontos 6-barrelled tracked recoilless rifle platform wasn’t particularly successful. I’m not sure why anyone would think a 6-barrelled mortar a good idea.
Procurement of Ontos was largely driven by civilian DoD appointees and the cost savings that were promised vs. procuring more tanks (I believe M48s at the time).
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