Poor Dyna-Soar. Even its name seems to have jinxed it.<p>Some cool tech was there. They got so far with it as well — search for it on YouTube and you can find videos of various aspects of research that went into it. [1..6]<p>I like the landing skids that used the stretching of metal as the means to adsorb the shock of landing - reminds me somewhat of the metal honeycomb that collapsed to adsorb the lunar module landing on the moon.<p>I believe water circulated through the skin of the craft near the astronaut compartment to take heat away during reentry.<p>I recall that the nose of the craft was made of a rather interesting material. That may've been shared with the X-15 as well.<p>Enough blueprints too are available for the craft-that-never-flew that I enjoyed creating a kind of balsa-kit-that-never-existed. [7] A very pretty plane it was/wasnt.<p>[1] <a href="https://youtu.be/TkWg4dd7e8w" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/TkWg4dd7e8w</a><p>[2] <a href="https://youtu.be/8Bn5A0oNpuM" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/8Bn5A0oNpuM</a><p>[3] <a href="https://youtu.be/drfcrl_vc8M" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/drfcrl_vc8M</a><p>[4] <a href="https://youtu.be/muNYhj9DFrM" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/muNYhj9DFrM</a><p>[5] <a href="https://youtu.be/TikodTMGdP0" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/TikodTMGdP0</a><p>[6] <a href="https://youtu.be/NXD6oAEDKqA" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/NXD6oAEDKqA</a><p>[7] <a href="https://imgur.com/a/VEqKG13" rel="nofollow">https://imgur.com/a/VEqKG13</a>
The author was writing just ahead of the Dream Chaser development but does mention the X-37 "(This problem cropped up again in the X-37B program and resulted in a big payload shroud being added.)." I think that DC and X-37 are great capabilities to have even if they require shrouds on the way up.<p><i>Dream Chaser is an American reusable lifting-body spaceplane being developed by Sierra Nevada Corporation (SNC) Space Systems. Originally intended as a crewed vehicle, the Dream Chaser Space System is set to be produced after the cargo variant, Dream Chaser Cargo System, is operational.</i><p><i>The Dream Chaser design is derived from NASA's HL-20 Personnel Launch System spaceplane concept, which in turn is descended from a series of test vehicles, including the X-20 Dyna-Soar, Northrop M2-F2, Northrop M2-F3, Northrop HL-10, Martin X-24A and X-24B, and Martin X-23 PRIME.</i><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dream_Chaser" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dream_Chaser</a><p><i>The Boeing X-37, also known as the Orbital Test Vehicle (OTV), is a reusable robotic spacecraft. It is boosted into space by a launch vehicle, then re-enters Earth's atmosphere and lands as a spaceplane.</i><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_X-37" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_X-37</a>
Space nerds are running down the street with pitchforks and torches on the way to this guy's house right now (or were in 2008 I'm sure).<p>But he's not wrong.
> It's an odd feature of aerospace history that many prototype aircraft that never went into production become "cultplanes". Some prominent examples are flying wings, Avro Arrow, B-70 Valkyrie, anything designed by the Nazis in 1945.<p>I don't care about the other planes on the list, but the B-70 Valkyrie absolutely deserves to be a cult plane.<p>It is one of the most visually striking and beautiful planes ever built. Combine that with an absolutely insane performance characteristics and engineering, and you can see why it is a cult plane.<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_XB-70_Valkyrie" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_XB-70_Valkyrie</a>