Some serious modeling going on... A nearly four foot XB70 - !!!!! - gotta pic...?
Not yet, but I'll see about digging that storage tub out and doing a photo-inventory. I also need to take pics of my amps. I owe a thread of them elsewhere.
why the fasconation with the 12/71...? (the one that flew fastest is over here - posted that pic some time back but will post again...)
... the one that flew the fastest
unclassified. In the
Sled Driver series of books, the retired SR-71 pilot who wrote them matter-of-factly stated that the Blackbird regularly attained speeds well in excess of Mach 3.5 and actually had to be throttled back at high speeds as the engines became more efficient as they took on more ramjet rather than turbojet properties. Its top speed is still classified, but it's not out of the realm of probability to imagine that it could do Mach 4+, especially since it regularly outran Chinese and Soviet missiles that should have been able to catch it at altitude if all it could do was 3.31, its published "cruising speed."
As for my love for the Blackbird, it's just a mean looking delta that flies like is has a reason to, and when my Dad was in the Air Force during the early 60's, he was stationed at Kadena, Okinawa, where the CIA kept their A-12 before the Air Force had ownership and it became the SR-71. He mainly gassed KC-135's, F-4's, and the odd B-52, but his stories about the flight line shutting down whenever they brought out the Blackbird are too cool.
the only "live" one I ever saw was the one that set the speed record (now held by Concorde) for the fastest Atlantic crossing in 1974 and displayed at Farnborough that year - I missed the F22 that displayed in '08 but did see the last European appearance of the F117 in '07... got to work on Concorde back in the day... (British Airways from 76-81)
I love the Concorde, too. Have you seen the documentary on its last flight? I'm indifferent to the F-22, and am probably a bit skeptical about some of its capability claims, same with the "Wobblin' Goblin" F-117. It seems with those planes, rather than push the envelope for performance, they rely too much on technology to take the pilot out of the equation and are basically precursors to a totally unmanned fighter fleet. With the F-117 retired, (shortwave radar's a bitch ain't it?) and the F-22's production (rightfully) stopped, the US is trying to make an F-16 out of the VERY underwhelming F-35 JSF, which is basically a "Stealth Harrier." IMO too much money has been pumped into too many programs that don't deliver, all in the name of politics. It is with no small satisfaction to note that the Eurofighter was able to get target locks on the F-22 at much longer ranges than thought possible when the US borrowed some for evaluation. The dogfighting results remain unpublished, but I'm guessing the Raptor fared no better there either. An SU-37 would be even less forgiving.
BTW, saw another Redtailed Hawk today on the way to my ballroom dance class (don't ask.)