Rocket-powered aircraft
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A rocket-powered aircraft or rocket plane is an aircraft that uses a rocket engine for propulsion, sometimes in addition to airbreathing jet engines. Rocket planes can achieve much higher speeds than similarly sized jet aircraft, but typically for at most a few minutes of powered operation, followed by a gliding flight. Unhindered by the need for oxygen from the atmosphere, they are suitable for very high-altitude flight. They are also capable of delivering much higher acceleration and shorter takeoffs. Many rocket aircraft may be drop launched from transport planes, as take-off from ground may leave them with insufficient time to reach high altitudes.
Rockets have been used simply to assist the main propulsion in the form of jet assisted take off (JATO) also known as rocket assisted take off (RATO or RATOG). Not all rocket planes are of the conventional takeoff like "normal" aircraft. Some types have been air-launched from another plane, while other types have taken off vertically – nose in the air and tail to the ground ("tail-sitters").
Because of the use of heavy propellants and other practical difficulties of operating rockets, the majority of rocket planes have been built for experimental or research use, as interceptor fighters and space aircraft.
History
Background
Paulet would go on to visit the German rocket association
On 11 June 1928, as part of the Opel RAK program of Fritz von Opel and Max Valier, Lippisch Ente became the first aircraft to fly under rocket power.[5][6][7] During the following year, the Opel RAK.1 became the first purpose-built rocket plane to fly with Fritz von Opel himself as the pilot.[8] The Opel RAK.1 flight is also considered the world's first public flight of a manned rocket plane since it took place before a large crowd and with world media in attendance.
On 28 June 1931, another ground-breaking rocket flight was conducted by the
World War II
The
The first rocket plane ever to be
A typical Me 163 tactic was to fly vertically upward through the bombers at 9,000 m (30,000 ft), climb to 10,700–12,000 m (35,100–39,400 ft), then dive through the formation again, firing as they went. This approach afforded the pilot two brief chances to fire a few rounds from his cannons before gliding back to his airfield.
Other German rocket-powered aircraft were pursued as well, including the
Japan, who was allied to Nazi Germany, secured the design schematics of the Me 163 Komet.[19] After considerable effort, it successfully established its own production capability, which was used to produce a limited number of its own copies, known as the Mitsubishi J8M, which performed its first powered flight on 7 July 1945.[20] Furthermore, Japan attempted to develop its own domestically designed rocket-powered interceptor, the Mizuno Shinryu; neither the J8M or the Shinryu ever saw combat.[21] The Japanese also produced approximately 850 Yokosuka MXY-7 Ohka rocket-powered suicide attack aircraft during the Second World War, a number were deployed in the Battle of Okinawa. Postwar analysis concluded that the Ohka's impact was negligible, and that no U.S. Navy capital ships had been hit during the attacks due to the effective defensive tactics that were employed.[22]
Other experimental aircraft included the Soviet Bereznyak-Isayev BI-1 that flew in 1942 while the Northrop XP-79 was originally planned with rocket engines but switched to jet engines for its first and only flight in 1945. A rocket assisted P-51D Mustang was developed by North American Aviation that could attain 515 mph (829 km/h).[23][24] The engine ran on fumaric acid and aniline which was stored in two 75-US-gallon (280 L) under wing drop tanks.[24] The plane was tested in flight in April 1945. The rocket engine could run for about a minute.[24] Similarly, the Messerschmitt Me 262 "Heimatschützer" series used a combination of rocket and jet propulsion to allow for shorter take-offs, faster climb rate, and even greater speeds.[25]
Cold War era
During 1946, the Soviet Mikoyan-Gurevich I-270 was constructed in response to a Soviet Air Forces requirement issued during the previous year for a rocket-powered interceptor aircraft in the point-defence role.[26] The design of the I-270 incorporated several pieces of technology that had been developed by Sergei Korolev between 1932 and 1943.[27][28]
During 1947, a key milestone in aviation history was reached by the rocket-powered Bell X-1, which became the first aircraft to break the speed of sound in level flight, and would be the first of a series of NACA/NASA rocket-powered aircraft.[29] Amongst these experimental aircraft were the North American X-15 and X-15A2 designs, which were operated for around a decade and eventually attained a maximum speed of Mach 6.7 as well as a peak altitude in excess of 100 km, setting new records in the process.[30]
During the 1950s, the British developed several mixed power designs to cover the performance gap that existed in then-current turbojet designs. The rocket was the main engine for delivering the speed and height required for high speed interception of high level bombers and the turbojet gave increased fuel economy in other parts of flight, most notably to ensure that the aircraft was able to make a powered landing rather than risking an unpredictable gliding return.
Work reached a more advanced stage with the Avro 720's rival, the
Both the SR.53 and its SR.177 cousin were relatively close to attain production status when wider political factors bore down upon the programme. During 1957, a massive re-thinking of air defence philosophy in Britain occurred, which was embodied in the 1957 Defence White Paper. This paper called for manned combat aircraft to be replaced by missiles, and thus the prospects of an order from the RAF evaporated overnight.[41] While both the Royal Navy and Germany remained potential customers for the SR.177, the confidence of both parties was shaken by the move.[42] Further factors, such as the Lockheed bribery scandals to compel overseas nations to order the Lockheed F-104 Starfighter, also served to undermine the sale prospects of the SR.177, costing potential customers such as Germany and Japan.[43]
Throughout the late 1940s and 1950s, the French Air Staff also had considerable interest in rocket-powered aircraft.
At the request of the French Air Staff, the French aircraft company
The advancement of the turbojet engine output, the advent of missiles, and advances in radar had made a return to mixed power unnecessary.
The development of Soviet rockets and satellites was the driving force behind the development of NASA's space program. In the early 1960s, American research into the
The Lunar Landing Research Vehicle was a mixed powered vehicle- a jet engine cancelled 5/6 of the force due to gravity, and the rocket power was able to simulate the Apollo lunar lander.[53]
Various versions of the
The Northrop HL-10, Northrop M2-F2 and Northrop M2-F3 were examples of a lifting body, which are aircraft which have very little if any wing and simply obtain lift from the body of the vehicle. Another example is backslider rockets in amateur rocketry.[citation needed]
Post Cold War era
The
During 2003, another privately developed rocket-powered aircraft performed its first flight. SpaceShipOne functions both as a rocket-powered aircraft—with wings and aerodynamic control surfaces—as well as a spaceplane—with RCS thrusters for control in the vacuum of space. For their work, the SpaceShipOne team were awarded the Space Achievement Award.[57]
In April 2019, the Chinese company Space Transportation carried out a test of a 3,700-kilogram technology demonstrator named Jiageng-1. The 8.7-meter-long plane has a wingspan of 2.5 meters and it is a part of development of the larger, future Tianxing-I-1 vertical takeoff, horizontal landing reusable launch vehicle.[58]
Planned rocket-powered aircraft
- Aerial Regional-scale Environmental Survey
- Skylon (spacecraft)
- SpaceShipTwo
- XCOR Lynx
- Zero Emission Hyper Sonic Transport
See also
- List of rocket aircraft
- List of vehicle speed records
- Rocket Racing League (RRL)
- Zero-length launch, launching air-breathing aircraft with rockets
References
Citations
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- ^ a b Mejía 2017, pp. 113.
- ^ a b c Mejía 2017, pp. 115–116.
- ^ "Un documental reivindicará al peruano Paulet como pionero de la astronáutica". EFE (in Spanish). 2012-04-05. Retrieved 2022-03-11.
- ^ https://www.airforcemag.com/article/0904rocket/ article by Walter J. Boyne in Air Force Magazine, September 1, 2004
- ^ "Lippisch Ente."[permanent dead link] The Internet Encyclopedia of Science: Experimental Aircraft. Retrieved: 26 September 2011.
- ^ Ford 2013, p. 224.
- ^ Houard, Georges (10 October 1929). "Le planeur à fusée de Fritz von Opel a volé à Francfort sur deux kilomètres". Les Ailes. 9 (434): 11. Retrieved 25 July 2019.
- ^ "Esplora il significato del termine: Cattaneo: pioniere del volo, incompreso in patriaCattaneo: pioniere del volo, incompreso in patria". archiviostorico.corriere.it. 2004. Archived from the original on 2015-11-22.
- ^ "June the 28th 1931 First Rocket Flight in Milan by Ettore Cattaneo.avi". youtube.com. Retrieved 6 December 2020.
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- ^ a b Späte 1989, p. 252.
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- ^ Bachem 1952, pp. 89–96.
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- ^ Green 1971, p. 114.
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- ^ Larry Davis – DEVELOPING THE XP-86 Archived 2012-02-09 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ a b c Santiago – The Rocket-Boosted P-51 Mustang – Tuesday, December 28, 2010
- ^ Reddin, Shamus http://www.walterwerke.co.uk/ato/me262i.htm Me.262 Heimatschützer I. The Walter 109-509.S1 Assisted Take-Off Unit. "The Hellmuth Walter Rocket Motor Web Site" Retrieved: 2 February 2022
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- ^ 1943
- ^ "Bell X-1." Archived 2008-05-17 at the Wayback Machine allstar.fiu.edu. Retrieved: 26 September 2011.
- ^ "North American X-15 High-Speed Research Aircraft." Aerospaceweb.org, 24 November 2008.
- ^ Jones Aeroplane Monthly November 1994, pp. 32–33.
- ^ Wood 1975, p. 55.
- ^ Mason 1992, p. 400.
- ^ a b London 2010, p. 30.
- ^ Flight 24 May 1957, pp. 698–699.
- ^ Wood 1975, p. 61.
- ^ London 2010, p. 31.
- ^ Wood 1975, p. 63.
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- ^ Wood 1975, p. 57.
- ^ Wood 1975, pp. 68-69.
- ^ Wood 1975, p. 69.
- ^ Wood 1986, pp. 67–69.
- ^ a b c d Pelt 2012, p. 168.
- ^ Pelt 2012, pp. 163-164.
- ^ a b c Pelt 2012, p. 164.
- ^ a b Gunston 1981, pp. 218–219.
- ^ Pelt 2012, p. 161.
- ^ Pelt 2012, pp. 161–162.
- ^ Jackson 1986, p. 91.
- ^ "The Paris Show..." Flight, 31 May 1957. p. 740. Retrieved: 15 October 2010.
- ^ Day, Dwayne. "A bat outta Hell: the ISINGLASS Mach 22 follow-on to OXCART." The Space Review, 12 April 2010. Retrieved: 26 September 2011.
- ^ Matranga, Gene J., C. Wayne Ottinger and Calvin R. Jarvis with C. Christian Gelzer. "Aerospace History #35 NASA SP-2004-4535: Unconventional, Contrary, and Ugly: The Lunar Landing Research Vehicle." NASA, 2005.
- ^ Knapp, Alex (18 June 2014). "Bootstrapping To The Stars". Forbes. Retrieved 19 June 2014.
- ^ "Flying inside the groove: the latest rocket-powered test aircraft take just four seconds to get into the air from ignition. The brink of take-off for the RRL". Aerospace Testing International. June 2010. pp. 50–54. Retrieved 6 September 2010.
- ^ Chow, Denise (26 April 2010). "Rocket Racing League Unveils New Flying Hot Rod". space.com.
- ^ "Symposium Awards". Archived from the original on 3 February 2009. Retrieved 31 January 2012.
- ^ Jones, Andrew (26 April 2019). "Chinese firms Space Transportation and Linkspace test reusable launcher technologies". spacenews.com.
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