10-04-2025, 05:50 PM
(10-04-2025, 04:31 PM)Avicula Wrote: I think it has a lot to do with putting the money in the programs that would yield the greatest benefit. We had speed licked fairly early on and have had to wait for materials and manufacturing to experience their own technological breakthroughs to get us to that next level. As I understand it, a major factor in Lockheed’s latest fast mover (I guess they’re going with “SR-72”) was their ability to literally print some of the more complex internal geometries that allow them to finally put some older theoretical propulsion concepts to the test. And apparently it has paid off.
Same goes for the stuff available to do the manufacturing and the materials that actually go into the bits and bobs. Just like when they were designing the A-12…They KNEW Titanium alloys were the key. They just hadn’t invented the processes that made those pieces possible. I’d imagine that there have been some incredible leaps forward in recent years with graphene and ceramics that allow the really smart people build the stuff that can tolerate the unbelievable surface temperatures a hypersonic airplane has to endure for loooooong periods of time.
They COULD have stayed in that lane and certainly would have made some incredible progress had they done so, but once people saw what Ufimtsev’s ideas could do in the real world, the decision was made to pursue stealth as the primary focus. And since stealth and fast don’t typically go together, as one more or less negates the other, speed took a back seat.
While it is purely speculation on my part, I suspect that considerable progress has been made in the union of speed with low observability in aircraft. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn one day that someone found their way into the basement and dusted off some old work that had to be shelved and found a way to make it work. For instance…All of the chest beating about hypersonic missiles. One only need look at something like Nike Sprint to realize that the primary reason we don’t currently HAVE a system like that is because we found better ways to accomplish the same end goals. We did 0 to Mach 10 in five seconds over half a century ago. Dreamed it up, designed it, built it, tested it, fielded it, then decided “nah. We don’t NEED that…”
Same for Projects Isinglass and Rhineberry. Both of those are nearly 60 years ago now.
We have done speed before, and we did it well. Now it looks like perhaps speed will again be a priority in some instances and if that’s the case, it will be done and it will be done well. My only gripe is that most of us will never get to see the end result.
They’re still trying to catch up in some areas. They’ve had serious issues with TBCC integration and operation, and even with basic scramjets. The engines have always been a sticking point for speed. A close second has been skin cooling. One of the fun new barriers was eight minutes. They had several tests that at eight minutes the airframe had lost so much skin the computers could no longer keep control.
