Xb70a

These were the days! The ultimate experimental airplane test program...brake locking on landing, paint coming off at SS speeds. Engineering done with slide rules. Not a cub but interesting to watch.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6aoVFs5fdZI

I know the guy that designed that airplane. Ed Horstman. He lives here in the valley. Very nice guy!! He also has designed some world class racing sail boats. He's been out here to my hangar a couple times. I gave him a picture of me hugging the nose gear on the XB-70 at Wright Patt when I was back there teaching a paint class...he thought that was pretty cool! That's the only jet that's ever really held my interest, and that was before I met Ed!
John

Way cool. And a B-58 as chase to boot!

It scared the pee out of the Soviets. They came up with the Mig-25 Foxbat to counter it, spending billions in research and production only to see the US say, "never mind!".

[emoji106]

I remember reading a magazine article on the loss of one of these. Joe Walker was the best chase there was. He could close up to where he could tell you if fasteners were phillips or straight blade. During a GE photo shoot with lots of other GE powered single engine fighters Joe got too close under the right wing and somehow wound up inverted over the top and broke off the tails. With the tips cranked the pilots didn't notice at first and barely managed to eject. They had to move back into clamshells to survive ejection and the Gs of the spin made it marginal. One of them got his elbow sliced off by the shell as it closed. The article was in Life Magazine, it went on for pages with lots of drawings, back when most people were interested in aerospace.

These people were incredible. A real point of pride for Americans. The crews and pilots all put the lives on the line. As I recall I was driving a 57 Chevy. Points and condenser, and a Hurst shifter. Talk about progress!

I make the trek to the air force museum every couple of years.(two hour drive) The XB70 is one that I stand around a long time. I was fascinated with it when it was being developed and the fascination continues. I was also locked in on the B58 Hustler. First plastic jet model I built as a young man. Much later in life I became friends with the air force's highest time B58 pilot, Capt Bill Hale (now deceased) He survived an eject out of the B58 shortly after T/O out of Bunker Hill AFB on 12apr62. I enjoyed Bill's stories about the B58 and other a/c he flew in the air force inventory. He finished out his flying career at UPS on the 747 then enjoyed his quicksilver ultralight and his AN-2 biplane till he no longer flew. Plenty of great ones out there that never get talked about.

Amazing to me how that generation got her done. I'm pecking on a touchscreen phone that has probably a million times the computing power they had then. And the XB70 looks like it could have rolled off the line yesterday. What a great country!