Looking forward to the X-51 launch.

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bdewoody

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I hope this test is a big success as it may lead to a whole new class of LEO vehicles.
 
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Horizon84

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Same here. Although I was hoping scram-jet tech would have been a little bit more advanced at this point. Hopefully in a few years we might see a larger test vehicle with a combined cycle turbofan-ramjet system so the vehicle doesn't need a rocket strapped to it butt to get off the ground and up to speed. I wonder how far off a vehicle capable of achieving low orbit would be.
 
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EarthlingX

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Some redundant info :

From Edwards Air Force Base :
X-51 getting ready for first flight
Posted 3/4/2010 Updated 3/4/2010
by Diane Betzler
Aerotech News and Review

3/4/2010 - EDWARDS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. -- There's some pretty exciting stuff going on at Edwards Air Force Base as the flight test center team gets ready to conduct an awe-inspiring X-51 first flight.
The plan is to air launch the X-51A WaveRider using an expendable solid rocket booster from under the wing of a B-52, this spring.

Lt. Col. Todd Venema, director of the Hypersonic Combined Test Force explained just how the test team plans to do that. "We're going to take the WaveRider and launch it from a B-52 at 50,000 feet over the Pacific Ocean and the vehicle is going to drop away."
Colonel Venema further explained that if all goes as planned, the vehicle will be accelerated by a solid rocket booster up to about Mach 4.5. Once it reaches that speed the booster will drop away and the vehicle and the engine will ignite and accelerate the vehicle up to Mach 6, about six times the speed of sound.

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SDC Article :
Air Force to Test New Hypersonic Aircraft
By Turner Brinton
posted: 09 March 2010
06:52 am ET

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Air Force is gearing up for the first of four planned test flights of a hypersonic aircraft designed to operate for much longer durations and cover far greater distances than previous platforms of its type.

Wiki : Edwards Air Force Base
Edwards Air Force Base (IATA: EDW, ICAO: KEDW, FAA LID: EDW) is a United States Air Force and NASA base located on the border of Kern County, Los Angeles County, and San Bernardino County, California, in the Antelope Valley.
Wiki : Boeing X-51
The Boeing X-51 is a scramjet demonstration aircraft for hypersonic (Mach 7, around 8,050 km/h) flight testing.

Boeing : X-51 WaveRider
The X-51 program is a consortium between Boeing and Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne. The customers are the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, with support from NASA.
X-51_WaveRider.jpg
 
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bdewoody

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Even thoygh it's still just a small scale early design I'm more excited about this vehicle than SpaceX or the others as it represents a totally new way to achieve orbit if it works.
 
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3488

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I agree, this should be quite something special.

Andrew Brown.
 
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nimbus

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Saw rocket scientists at NSF say scramjets aren't interesting for space access because of mass ratios. Only air breather I've seen get positive appreciation is Skylon, on condition that it lives up to projections.

Not that it's not a cool gizmo though. It's too bad we (probably) won't see close/on-board video like we get from Shuttle launches.
 
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vulture4

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My impression is that the DOD interest in this technology is for high-speed cruise missiles, not for orbital launch. Scramjets have a fairly narrow range of efficient speeds and altitudes.
 
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js117

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vulture4":326hvba1 said:
My impression is that the DOD interest in this technology is for high-speed cruise missiles, not for orbital launch. Scramjets have a fairly narrow range of efficient speeds and altitudes.

I agree with you the DOD is not intrested in commercial suborbital spaceships, or orbital use only a faster wepons platform, or spy platform.
If it works it will it will be clasified for years to come and not avalable for commercial use.
 
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bdewoody

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vulture4":1biomigp said:
My impression is that the DOD interest in this technology is for high-speed cruise missiles, not for orbital launch. Scramjets have a fairly narrow range of efficient speeds and altitudes.
Yes, but behind most every commercial success especially in aviation there was a secret military project. Case in point is the greatly successful commercial jet industry that without the previous secret military development program would never have been developed.
 
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Zipi

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bdewoody":2tzw5xl2 said:
Case in point is the greatly successful commercial jet industry that without the previous secret military development program would never have been developed.

Maybe "never" is a bit too strong word here... Those would have been developed no matter what, but it would have taken much more time. Technology development goes always on, but the pace differs by the current needs.
 
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EarthlingX

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boeing.mediaroom.com : WaveRider flight test on May 25th
EDWARDS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif., May 20, 2010 -- The Boeing Company [NYSE: BA] announced today that the X-51A WaveRider will make its first hypersonic flight test attempt from Edwards Air Force Base on Tuesday, May 25. The unmanned aerial vehicle will be released from a B-52 bomber off the southern California coast.

The X-51A is expected to fly autonomously for five minutes -- powered by a supersonic combustion ramjet (scramjet) motor -- accelerate to about Mach 6 and transmit large amounts of data to ground stations before it splashes down into the Pacific and breaks up, as planned. There are no plans to recover the flight test vehicle, one of four built.

"In those 300 seconds, we hope to learn more about hypersonic flight with a practical scramjet engine than all previous flight tests combined," said Charlie Brink, X-51A program manager with the Air Force Research Laboratory's Propulsion Directorate at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. The longest previous hypersonic scramjet flight test, performed by a NASA X-43 in 2004, was faster, but lasted only about 10 seconds and used less logistically supportable hydrogen fuel.

Couple of X-51 videos is on this page, but direct links don't work, so you will have to click two times :

http://www.boeing.com/bds/mediakit/2010/nss/
 
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docm

Guest
LA Times.....

An aircraft resembling a large bodyboard detached from a flying B-52 bomber and then shot across the Pacific on Wednesday at more than 3,500 mph, shattering aviation records and reigniting decades-long efforts to develop a vehicle that could travel faster than a speeding bullet.

The unmanned X-51 WaveRider, powered by an air-breathing hypersonic engine that has virtually no moving parts, was launched midair off the coast near Point Mugu. It sped westward for 200 seconds before plunging into the ocean as planned. Previous attempts at hypersonic flights lasted no more than 10 seconds.

"Everything went very well for a first flight," said Charlie Brink, the X-51 program manager for the Air Force. "For things to go off the way they did, we're confident this technology has a bright future."

Since the 1960s, the Air Force has been flirting with hypersonic technology, which can propel vehicles at a velocity that cannot be achieved from traditional turbine-powered jet engines.
 
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