1.
General Motors
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With global headquarters at the Renaissance Center in Detroit, Michigan, United States, GM manufactures cars and trucks in 35 countries. In 2008,8.35 million GM cars and trucks were sold globally under various brands, current auto brands are Buick, Cadillac, Chevrolet, GMC, Holden, and Wuling. Former GM automotive brands include McLaughlin, Oakland, Oldsmobile, Pontiac, Hummer, Saab, Saturn, Vauxhall, the company was founded by William C. Durant on September 16,1908 as a holding company. The company was the largest automobile manufacturer from 1931 through 2007, in addition to brands selling assembled vehicles, GM also has had various automotive-component and non-automotive brands, many of which it divested in the 1980s through 2000s. General Motors produces vehicles in 37 countries under twelve brands, Chevrolet, Buick, GMC, Cadillac, Holden, HSV, Opel, Vauxhall, Wuling, Baojun, Jie Fang, and Ravon. The current company, General Motors Company LLC, was formed in 2009 following the bankruptcy of General Motors Corporation, the new company purchased the majority of the assets of the old GM, including the brand General Motors. In addition to its twelve brands, General Motors also holds a 20% stake in IMM, General Motors employs 212,000 people and does business in more than 140 countries. General Motors is divided into five segments, GM North America, Opel Group, GM International Operations, GM South America. General Motors led global vehicle sales for 77 consecutive years from 1931 through 2007, longer any other automaker. General Motors acts in most countries outside the U. S. via wholly owned subsidiaries, GMs OnStar subsidiary provides vehicle safety, security and information services. In 2009, General Motors shed several brands, closing Saturn, Pontiac, and Hummer, in 2010, the reorganized GM made an initial public offering that was one of the worlds top five largest IPOs to date, and returned to profitability later that year. General Motors Corporation was formed on September 16,1908, in Flint, Michigan, GMs co-founder was Charles Stewart Mott, whose carriage company was merged into Buick prior to GMs creation. Over the years, Mott became the largest single stockholder in GM, and spent his life with his Mott Foundation, GM acquired Oldsmobile later that year. In 1909, Durant brought in Cadillac, Elmore, Oakland, also in 1909, GM acquired the Reliance Motor Truck Company of Owosso, Michigan, and the Rapid Motor Vehicle Company of Pontiac, Michigan, the predecessors of GMC Truck. Durant, along with R. S. McLaughlin, lost control of GM in 1910 to a bankers trust, because of the amount of debt taken on in its acquisitions. The next year, Durant started the Chevrolet Motor Car Company in the U. S. and in Canada in 1915, Durant took back control of the company after one of the most dramatic proxy wars in American business history. Durant then reorganized General Motors Company into General Motors Corporation in 1916, merging Chevrolet with GM, shortly thereafter, he again lost control, this time for good, after the new vehicle market collapsed. These facilities were added to the factories that were exclusive to Cadillac, Buick, Oldsmobile, Oakland
2.
United States
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Forty-eight of the fifty states and the federal district are contiguous and located in North America between Canada and Mexico. The state of Alaska is in the northwest corner of North America, bordered by Canada to the east, the state of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific Ocean. The U. S. territories are scattered about the Pacific Ocean, the geography, climate and wildlife of the country are extremely diverse. At 3.8 million square miles and with over 324 million people, the United States is the worlds third- or fourth-largest country by area, third-largest by land area. It is one of the worlds most ethnically diverse and multicultural nations, paleo-Indians migrated from Asia to the North American mainland at least 15,000 years ago. European colonization began in the 16th century, the United States emerged from 13 British colonies along the East Coast. Numerous disputes between Great Britain and the following the Seven Years War led to the American Revolution. On July 4,1776, during the course of the American Revolutionary War, the war ended in 1783 with recognition of the independence of the United States by Great Britain, representing the first successful war of independence against a European power. The current constitution was adopted in 1788, after the Articles of Confederation, the first ten amendments, collectively named the Bill of Rights, were ratified in 1791 and designed to guarantee many fundamental civil liberties. During the second half of the 19th century, the American Civil War led to the end of slavery in the country. By the end of century, the United States extended into the Pacific Ocean. The Spanish–American War and World War I confirmed the status as a global military power. The end of the Cold War and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 left the United States as the sole superpower. The U. S. is a member of the United Nations, World Bank, International Monetary Fund, Organization of American States. The United States is a developed country, with the worlds largest economy by nominal GDP. It ranks highly in several measures of performance, including average wage, human development, per capita GDP. While the U. S. economy is considered post-industrial, characterized by the dominance of services and knowledge economy, the United States is a prominent political and cultural force internationally, and a leader in scientific research and technological innovations. In 1507, the German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller produced a map on which he named the lands of the Western Hemisphere America after the Italian explorer and cartographer Amerigo Vespucci
3.
North American T-6 Texan
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Designed by North American Aviation, the T-6 is known by a variety of designations depending on the model and operating air force. Starting in 1948, the new United States Air Force designated it the T-6 and it remains a popular warbird aircraft used for airshow demonstrations and static displays. It has also used many times to simulate various Japanese aircraft. The Texan originated from the North American NA-16 prototype which, modified as the NA-26, was submitted as an entry for a USAAC Basic Combat aircraft competition in March,1937. The first model went into production and 180 were supplied to the USAAC as the BC-1 and 400 to the RAF as the Harvard I, the US Navy received 16 modified aircraft, designated the SNJ-1, and a further 61 as the SNJ-2 with a different engine. Three BC-2 aircraft were built before the shift to the advanced trainer designation, AT-6, the differences between the AT-6 and the BC-1 were new outer wing panels with a swept-forward trailing edge, squared-off wingtips, and a triangular rudder, producing the canonical Texan silhouette. Next came the AT-6A which was based on the NA-77 design and was powered by the Pratt & Whitney R-1340-49 Wasp radial engine, the USAAF received 1,549 and the US Navy 270. The AT-6B was built for training and could mount a.30 in machine gun on the forward fuselage. It used the R-1340-AN-1 engine, which was to become the standard for the remaining T-6 production, in late 1937, Mitsubushi purchased two NA-16s as technology demonstrators and possibly a licence to build more. However, the aircraft developed by Watanabe/Kyushu as the K10W1 bore no more than a superficial resemblance to the North American design and it was used in very small numbers by the Imperial Japanese Navy from 1942 onwards. After the war, the Japanese Air Self Defense Force operated Texans, the NA-88 design resulted in 2,970 AT-6C Texans and 2,400 as the SNJ-4. The RAF received 726 of the AT-6C as the Harvard IIA, modifications to the electrical system produced the AT-6D and SNJ-5. The AT-6D, redesignated the Harvard III, was supplied to the RAF, the AT-6G involved major advancements including a full-time hydraulic system and a steerable tailwheel and persisted into the 1950s as the USAF advanced trainer. Subsequently, the NA-121 design with a completely clear rearmost section on the canopy, gave rise to 25 AT-6F Texans for the USAAF and 931, as the SNJ-6 for the US Navy. The ultimate version, the Harvard 4, was produced by Canada Car and Foundry during the 1950s, a total of 15,495 T-6s of all variants were built. They also engaged in combat on a number of occasions. The Israeli Air Force bought 17 Harvards, and operated nine of them in the stages of the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, against the Egyptian ground forces. In the Sinai Campaign, IAF Harvards attacked Egyptian ground forces in Sinai Peninsula with two losses, communist guerillas called these aircraft O Galatas, because they saw them flying very early in the morning
4.
North American P-51 Mustang
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The North American Aviation P-51 Mustang is an American long-range, single-seat fighter and fighter-bomber used during World War II, the Korean War and other conflicts. The Mustang was designed in 1940 by North American Aviation in response to a requirement of the British Purchasing Commission, the Purchasing Commission approached North American Aviation to build Curtiss P-40 fighters under license for the Royal Air Force. Rather than build an old design from another company, North American Aviation proposed the design, the prototype NA-73X airframe was rolled out on 9 September 1940,102 days after the contract was signed, and first flew on 26 October. The Mustang was originally designed to use the Allison V-1710 engine and it was first flown operationally by the RAF as a tactical-reconnaissance aircraft and fighter-bomber. The addition of the Rolls-Royce Merlin to the P-51B/C model transformed the Mustangs performance at altitudes above 15,000 ft, the P-51 was also used by Allied air forces in the North African, Mediterranean, Italian and Pacific theaters. During World War II, Mustang pilots claimed to have destroyed 4,950 enemy aircraft, despite the advent of jet fighters, the Mustang remained in service with some air forces until the early 1980s. After the Korean War, Mustangs became popular civilian warbird and air racing aircraft, in April 1940 the British government established a purchasing commission in the United States, headed by Sir Henry Self. Self was given responsibility for Royal Air Force production and research and development, and also served with Sir Wilfrid Freeman. Self also sat on the British Air Council Sub-committee on Supply and one of his tasks was to organize the manufacturing and supply of American fighter aircraft for the RAF. At the time, the choice was limited, as no U. S. aircraft then in production or flying met European standards. The Curtiss-Wright plant was running at capacity, so P-40s were in short supply, North American Aviation was already supplying its Harvard trainer to the RAF, but was otherwise underutilized. NAA President Dutch Kindelberger approached Self to sell a new medium bomber, instead, Self asked if NAA could manufacture the Tomahawk under license from Curtiss. Kindelberger said NAA could have an aircraft with the same engine in the air sooner than establishing a production line for the P-40. In March 1940,320 aircraft were ordered by Sir Wilfred Freeman who had become the head of the Ministry of Aircraft Production. The NA-73X, which was designed by a led by lead engineer Edgar Schmued, followed the best conventional practice of the era. One was a wing designed using laminar flow airfoils which were developed co-operatively by North American Aviation and these airfoils generated very low drag at high speeds. The results of this test showed the superiority of the wing designed with the NAA/NACA 45–100 airfoils, the other feature was a new cooling arrangement that reduced the cooling drag. It was later discovered that, after lot of development, the assembly could take advantage of the Meredith Effect
5.
Fighter aircraft
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A fighter aircraft is a military aircraft designed primarily for air-to-air combat against other aircraft, as opposed to bombers and attack aircraft, whose main mission is to attack ground targets. The hallmarks of a fighter are its speed, maneuverability, many fighters have secondary ground-attack capabilities, and some are designed as dual-purpose fighter-bombers, often aircraft that do not fulfill the standard definition are called fighters. This may be for political or national security reasons, for advertising purposes, a fighters main purpose is to establish air superiority over a battlefield. Since World War I, achieving and maintaining air superiority has been considered essential for victory in conventional warfare, the word fighter did not become the official English-language term for such aircraft until after World War I. In the British Royal Flying Corps and Royal Air Force these aircraft were referred to as scouts into the early 1920s, the U. S. Army called their fighters pursuit aircraft from 1916 until the late 1940s. In most languages a fighter aircraft is known as a hunter, exceptions include Russian, where a fighter is an истребитель, meaning exterminator, and Hebrew where it is matose krav. As a part of nomenclature, a letter is often assigned to various types of aircraft to indicate their use. In Russia I was used, while the French continue to use C and this has always been the case, for instance the Sopwith Camel and other fighting scouts of World War I performed a great deal of ground-attack work. Several aircraft, such as the F-111 and F-117, have received fighter designations but had no fighter capability due to political or other reasons, the F-111B variant was originally intended for a fighter role with the U. S. Navy, but it was cancelled. This blurring follows the use of fighters from their earliest days for attack or strike operations against ground targets by means of strafing or dropping small bombs, versatile multirole fighter-bombers such as the F/A-18 Hornet are a less expensive option than having a range of specialized aircraft types. An interceptor is generally an aircraft intended to target bombers and so often trades maneuverability for climb rate, fighters were developed in World War I to deny enemy aircraft and dirigibles the ability to gather information by reconnaissance. Early fighters were very small and lightly armed by later standards, and most were built with a wooden frame, covered with fabric. As control of the airspace over armies became increasingly important all of the major powers developed fighters to support their military operations, between the wars, wood was largely replaced by steel tubing, then aluminium tubing, and finally aluminium stressed skin structures began to predominate. By World War II, most fighters were all-metal monoplanes armed with batteries of guns or cannons. By the end of the war, turbojet engines were replacing piston engines as the means of propulsion, further increasing aircraft speed. Since the weight of the engine was so less than on piston engined fighters. This in turn required the development of ejection seats so the pilot could escape, in the 1950s, radar was fitted to day fighters, since pilots could no longer see far enough ahead to prepare for any opposition. Since then, radar capabilities have grown enormously and are now the method of target acquisition
6.
North American B-25 Mitchell
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The North American B-25 Mitchell is an American twin-engine, medium bomber manufactured by North American Aviation. It was named in honor of Major General William Billy Mitchell, used by many Allied air forces, the B-25 served in every theater of World War II and after the war ended many remained in service, operating across four decades. Produced in numerous variants, nearly 10,000 Mitchells rolled from NAA factories and these included a few limited models, such as the United States Marine Corps PBJ-1 patrol bomber and the United States Army Air Forces F-10 reconnaissance aircraft and AT-24 trainers. The Air Corps issued a circular in March 1938 describing the performance they required from the next bombers — a payload of 1,200 lb with a range of 1,200 mi at more than 200 mph and those performance specifications led NAA to submit their NA-40 design. However, the experience from the XB-21 contributed to the design. The single NA-40 built flew first at the end of January 1939 and it went through several modifications to correct problems. These improvements included fitting 1,600 hp Wright R-2600 Twin Cyclone radial engines, in March 1939, in March 1939, North American delivered the substantially redesigned and improved NA-40 to the United States Army Air Corps for evaluation. It was in competition with other manufacturers designs but failed to win orders, however, the French had already opted for a revised Douglas 7B. Unfortunately, the NA-40B was destroyed in a crash on 11 April 1939 while undergoing testing, although the crash was not considered due to a fault with the aircraft design, the Army ordered the DB-7 as the A-20. There was no YB-25 for prototype service tests, in September 1939, the Air Corps ordered the NA-62 into production as the B-25, along with the other new Air Corps medium bomber, the Martin B-26 Marauder off the drawing board. The NA-40 lost out to the Douglas A-20 in the competition, but NAA developed a more advanced design, the NA-40B. Early into B-25 production, NAA incorporated a significant redesign to the wing dihedral, the first nine aircraft had a constant-dihedral, meaning the wing had a consistent, upward angle from the fuselage to the wingtip. Flattening the outer wing panels by giving them a slight anhedral angle just outboard of the engine nacelles nullified the problem, less noticeable changes during this period included an increase in the size of the tail fins and a decrease in their inward tilt at their tops. NAA continued design and development in 1940 and 1941, both the B-25A and B-25B series entered AAF service. The B-25B was operational in 1942, combat requirements lead to further developments. Before the year was over, NAA was producing the B-25C, also in 1942, the manufacturer began design work on the cannon-armed B-25G series. The NA-100 of 1943 and 1944 was an interim armament development at the Kansas City complex known as the B-25D2, Similar armament upgrades by U. S-based commercial modification centers involved about half of the B-25G series. Further development led to the B-25H, B-25J, and B-25J2, the gunship design concept dates to late 1942 and NAA sent a field technical representative to the SWPA
7.
Bomber
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A bomber is a combat aircraft designed to attack ground and sea targets by dropping air-to-ground weaponry, firing torpedoes or deploying air-launched cruise missiles. In 1912, during the First Balkan War, Bulgarian Air Force pilot Christo Toprakchiev suggested the use of aircraft to drop bombs on Turkish positions, captain Simeon Petrov developed the idea and created several prototypes by adapting different types of grenades and increasing their payload. This is deemed to be the first use of an aircraft as a bomber, the first heavier-than-air aircraft purposely designed for bombing were the Italian Caproni Ca 30 and British Bristol T. B.8, both of 1913. The Bristol T. B.8 was an early British single engined biplane built by the Bristol Aeroplane Company, under the command of Charles Rumney Samson, a bombing attack on German gun batteries at Middelkerke, Belgium was executed on 25 November 1914. The dirigible, or airship, was developed in the early 20th century, early airships were prone to disaster, but slowly the airship became more dependable, with a more rigid structure and stronger skin. Prior to the outbreak of war, Zeppelins, a larger and these were the first long range, strategic bombers. Although the German air arm was strong, with a total of 123 airships by the end of the war, they were vulnerable to attack and engine failure, German airships inflicted little damage on all 51 raids, with 557 Britons killed and 1,358 injured. The German Navy lost 53 of its 73 airships, and the German Army lost 26 of its 50 ships, the Caproni Ca 30 was built by Gianni Caproni in Italy. It was a biplane with three 67 kW Gnome rotary engines and first flew in October 1914. Test flights revealed power to be insufficient and the engine layout unworkable, the improved design was bought by the Italian Army and it was delivered in quantity from August 1915. Bombing raids and interdiction operations were carried out by French. Sustained attacks with a view to interrupting the enemys railway communications, in conjunction with the main operations of the Allied Armies. The most important bombers used in World War I were the French Breguet 14, British de Havilland DH-4, German Albatros C. III, the Russian Sikorsky Ilya Muromets, was the first four-engine bomber to equip a dedicated strategic bombing unit during World War I. This heavy bomber was unrivaled in the stages of the war. With engine power as a limitation, combined with the desire for accuracy and other operational factors. By the start of the war included, dive bomber — specially strengthened for vertical diving attacks for greater accuracy. Light bomber, medium bomber and heavy bomber — subjective definitions based on size, torpedo bomber — specialized aircraft armed with torpedoes. Ground attack aircraft — aircraft used against targets on a such as troop or tank concentrations
8.
North American F-86 Sabre
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The North American F-86 Sabre, sometimes called the Sabrejet, is a transonic jet fighter aircraft. Considered one of the best and most important fighter aircraft in that war and its success led to an extended production run of more than 7,800 aircraft between 1949 and 1956, in the United States, Japan and Italy. Variants were built in Canada and Australia, the Canadair Sabre added another 1,815 airframes, and the significantly redesigned CAC Sabre, had a production run of 112. The Sabre was by far the most-produced Western jet fighter, with production of all variants at 9,860 units. North American Aviation had produced the propeller-powered P-51 Mustang in World War II, by late 1944, North American proposed its first jet fighter to the U. S. Navy, which became the FJ-1 Fury. It was an unexceptional transitional jet fighter that had a wing derived from the P-51. Initial proposals to meet a United States Army Air Forces requirement for a medium-range, single-seat, in early 1945, North American Aviation submitted four designs. The USAAF selected one design over the others, and granted North American a contract to build three examples of the XP-86, despite the gain in speed, early studies revealed the XP-86 would have the same performance as its rivals, the XP-80 and XP-84. It was also feared that, because these designs were advanced in their development stages. Crucially, the XP-86 would not be able to meet the top speed of 600 mph. The North American F-86 Sabre was the first American aircraft to take advantage of research data seized from the German aerodynamicists at the end of World War II. By 1944, German engineers and designers had established the benefits of swept wings based on designs dating back to 1940. Study of the data showed that a wing would solve their speed problem. Because development of the XP-86 had reached a stage, the idea of changing the sweep of the wing was met with resistance from some senior North American staff. Despite stiff opposition, after results were obtained in wind tunnel tests. Many Sabres had the 6–3 wing retrofitted after combat experience was gained in Korea and this modification changed the wing airfoils to the NACA 0009-64 mod at the root and the NACA0008. 1–64 mod at the tip. Delays caused by the major redesign meant that manufacturing did not begin until after World War II, the XP-86 prototype, which would lead to the F-86 Sabre, was rolled out on 8 August 1947. The maiden flight occurred on 1 October 1947 with George Welch at the controls, flying from Muroc Dry Lake, the United States Air Forces Strategic Air Command had F-86 Sabres in service from 1949 through 1950
9.
Jet aircraft
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A jet aircraft is an aircraft propelled by jet engines. Jet aircraft generally cruise at faster than about M0.8 at altitudes around 10, Frank Whittle, an English inventor and RAF officer, developed the concept of the jet engine in 1928, and Hans von Ohain in Germany developed the concept independently in the early 1930s. He wrote in February 1936 to Ernst Heinkel, who led the construction of the worlds first turbojet aircraft, however, it can be argued that the English engineer A. A. Griffith, who published a paper in July 1926 on compressors and turbines, also deserves credit. After the first instance of powered flight, large number of jet powerplants were suggested, rené Lorin, Morize, Harris proposed systems for creating a jet efflux. Rocket-powered jet aircraft were pioneered in Germany, the first aircraft to fly under rocket power was the Lippisch Ente, in 1928. The Ente had previously flown as a glider. The next year, in 1929, the Opel RAK.1 became the first purpose-built rocket plane to fly, the turbojet, was invented in the 1930s, independently by Frank Whittle and later Hans von Ohain. The first turbojet aircraft to fly was the Heinkel He 178 V1 first prototype of the German Air Force, the first flight of a jet engined aircraft to come to popular attention was the Italian Caproni Campini N.1 motorjet prototype that flew on August 27,1940. It was the first jet aircraft recognised by the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale, Campini had proposed the motorjet in 1932. The British experimental Gloster E. 28/39 first took to the air on May 15,1941, the United States produced the Bell XP-59A using two examples of a version of the Whittle engine built by General Electric, which flew on October 1,1942. The Meteor was the first production jet as it entered production a few months before the Me 262, which itself had been in development since before the start of the war as Projekt 1065. The first operational jet fighter was the Messerschmitt Me 262, made by Germany during World War II and it was the fastest conventional aircraft of World War II – although there were faster aircraft propelled by unconventional means, such as the rocket-powered Messerschmitt Me 163 Komet. USSR tested its own Bereznyak-Isayev BI-1 in 1942, but the project was scrapped by Joseph Stalin in 1945. The Imperial Japanese Navy also developed jet aircraft in 1945, including the Nakajima J9Y Kikka, a modified, and slightly smaller version of the Me 262 that had folding wings. By the end of 1945, the US had introduced their next jet fighter, the Lockheed P-80 Shooting Star into service and the UK its second fighter design, the US introduced the North American B-45 Tornado, their first jet bomber, into service in 1948. Although capable of carrying nuclear weapons it was used for reconnaissance over Korea, the UK put the English Electric Canberra into service in 1951 as a light bomber. It was designed to fly higher and faster than any interceptor, BOAC operated the first commercial jet service, from London to Johannesburg, in 1952 with the de Havilland Comet jetliner. This highly innovative aircraft travelled far faster and higher than the aircraft, was much quieter, smoother
10.
North American X-15
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The X-15 set speed and altitude records in the 1960s, reaching the edge of outer space and returning with valuable data used in aircraft and spacecraft design. During the X-15 program,13 flights by eight pilots met the Air Force spaceflight criterion by exceeding the altitude of 50 miles, thus qualifying these pilots as being astronauts. The Air Force pilots qualified for astronaut wings immediately, while the pilots were eventually awarded NASA astronaut wings in 2005,35 years after the last X-15 flight. The only Navy pilot in the X-15 program never took the aircraft above the requisite 50 mile altitude and so as a result, of the 199 X-15 missions, two flights qualified as true space flights per the international definition of a spaceflight by exceeding 100 kilometers in altitude. The X-15 was based on a study from Walter Dornberger for the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics for a hypersonic research aircraft. The requests for proposal were published on 30 December 1954 for the airframe, the X-15 was built by two manufacturers, North American Aviation was contracted for the airframe in November 1955, and Reaction Motors was contracted for building the engines in 1956. Like many X-series aircraft, the X-15 was designed to be carried aloft, Air Force NB-52A, The High and Mighty One, and NB-52B, The Challenger served as carrier planes for all X-15 flights. Release took place at an altitude of about 8.5 miles, the X-15 fuselage was long and cylindrical, with rear fairings that flattened its appearance, and thick, dorsal and ventral wedge-fin stabilizers. Parts of the fuselage were heat-resistant nickel alloy, the retractable landing gear comprised a nose-wheel carriage and two rear skids. The skids did not extend beyond the fin, which required the pilot to jettison the lower fin just before landing. The X-15 was a program and changes were made to various systems over the course of the program. Alternatively, if the engine was not started the pilot went directly to a landing. The main rocket engine operated only for a short part of the flight. Without main engine thrust, the X-15s instruments and control surfaces remained functional, because the X-15 also had to be controlled in an environment where there was too little air for aerodynamic flight control surfaces, it had a reaction control system that used rocket thrusters. There were two different X-15 pilot control setups, one used three joysticks, the other, one joystick, the X-15 type with multiple control sticks for the pilot included a traditional rudder and stick, and another joystick on the left which sent commands to the reaction control system. A third joystick on the side was used during high-G maneuvers to augment the center stick. In addition to input, the X-15 Stability Augmentation System sent inputs to the aerodynamic controls to help the pilot maintain attitude control. The reaction control system could be operated in two modes, manual and automatic, the automatic mode used a feature called Reaction Augmentation System that helped stabilize the vehicle at high altitude
11.
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 higher speeds than similarly sized jet aircraft. Unhindered by the need for oxygen from the atmosphere, they are suitable for very high-altitude flight and they are also capable of delivering much higher acceleration and shorter takeoffs. Rockets have been used simply to assist the main propulsion in the form of jet assisted take off also known as rocket assisted take off, 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, rocket-powered flight was pioneered in Germany. The first aircraft to fly under rocket power was the Lippisch Ente, the Ente had previously been flown as a glider. The next year, in 1929, the Opel RAK.1 became the first purpose-built rocket plane to fly. The Heinkel He 176 was the world’s first aircraft to be propelled solely by a liquid-propellant rocket engine, the first rocket plane ever to be mass-produced was the Messerschmitt Me 163 interceptor in 1944, one of several German World War II attempts at rocket-powered aircraft. The Bachem Ba 349 Natter vertical takeoff manned rocket interceptor aircraft flew in prototype form, projects which never even reached the prototype stage include the Zeppelin Rammer, the Fliegende Panzerfaust and the Focke-Wulf Volksjäger. The Japanese also produced approximately 850 Yokosuka MXY7 Ohka rocket-powered suicide attack aircraft in World War II, a rocket assisted P-51D Mustang was developed by North American Aviation that could attain 515 mph. The engine ran on fumaric acid and aniline which was stored in two 75 gallon under wing drop tanks, the plane was tested in flight in April 1945. The rocket engine could run for about a minute, in 1946, the Soviet Mikoyan-Gurevich I-270 was built partly using technology developed by Sergei Korolev in 1943 and 1932. In 1947 the rocket-powered Bell X-1 was the first aircraft to break the speed of sound in level flight, the North American X-15 and X-15A2 designs were used for around a decade and eventually reached Mach 6.7 and over 100 km in altitude. In the 1950s the British developed mixed power designs to cover the gap that existed in then-current turbojet designs. The Saunders-Roe SR.53 was a design and was due to be developed into production when economics forced curtailment of most British aircraft programmes in the late 1950s. The advancement of the engine output, the advent of missiles. The development of Soviet rockets and satellites was the force behind the development of NASAs space program. Another similar program was ISINGLASS which was to be a rocket launched from a Boeing B-52 Stratofortress carrier, which was intended to achieve Mach 22
12.
North American XB-70 Valkyrie
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The North American Aviation XB-70 Valkyrie was the prototype version of the planned B-70 nuclear-armed, deep-penetration strategic bomber for the United States Air Force Strategic Air Command. In the late 1950s, North American Aviation designed the Valkyrie as a large, at these speeds, it was expected that the B-70 would be almost immune to interceptor aircraft, the only effective weapon against bomber aircraft at the time. The bomber would spend only a few minutes over a particular radar station, High speed also made the aircraft difficult to see on the radar displays and its high-altitude flight could not be matched by any contemporary Soviet fighter. The introduction of the first Soviet surface-to-air missiles in the late 1950s put the near-invulnerability of the B-70 in doubt, in response, the United States Air Force began flying its missions at low level, where the missile radars line of sight was limited by local terrain. In this low-level penetration role, the B-70 offered little additional performance over the B-52 it was meant to replace being far more expensive with shorter range, other alternate missions were proposed, but these were of limited scope. With the advent of intercontinental ballistic missiles during the late 1950s, the USAF eventually gave up fighting for its production and the B-70 program was canceled in 1961. Development was then turned over to a program to study the effects of long-duration high-speed flight. As such, two aircraft, designated XB-70A, were built, these aircraft were used for supersonic test-flights during 1964–69. In 1966, one crashed after colliding in mid-air with a smaller jet aircraft. At the time, nuclear weapons weighed several tons, and the need to carry fuel to fly that payload from the continental United States to the Soviet Union demanded large bombers. They also concluded that after release of bombs the aircraft would need supersonic speed to escape the critical blast-radius, the aviation industry had been studying this problem for some time. From the mid-1940s, there was much interest in using nuclear-powered aircraft in the bomber role, in a conventional jet engine, thrust is provided by heating air using jet fuel and accelerating it out a nozzle. In a nuclear engine, heat is supplied by a reactor, most designs also carried a small amount of jet fuel for use during high-power portions of flight—take-off and high-speed dashes. Zip fuels appeared to offer sufficient performance improvement to produce a bomber with supersonic speed. The new bomber was expected to service in 1963. Both nuclear and conventional designs would be considered, the nuclear-powered bomber was organized as Weapon System 125A and pursued simultaneously with the jet-powered version, Weapon System 110A. The requirement also called for a 50,000 pounds payload, the Air Force formed similar requirements for a WS-110L intercontinental reconnaissance system in 1955, but this was later canceled in 1958 due to better options. In July 1955, six contractors were selected to bid on WS-110A studies, Boeing and North American Aviation submitted proposals, and on 8 November 1955 were awarded contracts for Phase 1 development
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