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NNATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION TEE WO 2-4155
NW WASHINGTON,D .C. 20546 WO 3-6925

FOR RELEASE: SUNDAY

October 20, 1968
RELEASE NO: 68-178

HL-10 FIRST ROCKET FL1GHTII

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration's

HL-10 lifting body, a wingless experimental craft, is
expected to make its first rocket-propelled flight
Tuesday.

The HL-10, .'ie of several research vehicles under

study in the Jol-t. NASA-USAF programi for manned spacecraft
of the future, is intended to land under full control of its
pilot. The flight test program is investigating p:l oting
problems and flight characteristics under conditions that
represent the terminal portion of space flight from low
supersonic speeds down to final approach and landing.

Rocket propulsion will permit higher speeds and eventually

will push the HL-10 to velocities above -he speed of sounds

NASA's Flight Research Center, Edwards, Calif., has made 11

glide flights of the HL-1Q to study the aerodynamic and handling
qualities at subsonic speeds.

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These flights, launched at 45,000 feet from a B-52 airplane,

descended in a four-minute glide to landing on the Rogers dry
lake at Edwards.

The next series of flights will be rocket propelled to

investigate the behavior of the vehicle and its controllability
in the transonic speed range (Mach 0.8-1.2). For the first on
rocket power, the pilot will be Maj. Jerauld R. Gentry, USAF.

He will be air-launched at 4.0,000 feet over a point about eight

miles northwest of Lancaster, Calif., then will descend to about
36,000 as he ignites the rocket engine.

From that altitude, Gentry will climb to the planned maxi-

mum altitude of 45,000 feet. As the HL-10 is climbing through
43,000 feet, 165 seconds after launch, the rocket engine will
shut down from fuel exhaustion, reaching maximum speed of Mach
0.8 (about 600 mph).,

The pilot will then glide into the landing pattern. The
landing pattern and approach will be almost identical to those
of the previous glide flights. He has practiced the burnout-to-
landing sequence on unpowered flights.

The flight path is planned to remain near two dry Sake beds,
for emergency land!ng in case the rocket engine malfunctions.

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Later flights will increase the speed and altitude of the

HL-10 step by step, eventually reaching Lhe maximum design speed
of nearly twice the speed of sound and altitude of about OOOO

feet.

An ultimate objective of the joint NASA-Air Force lifting

body research flight program is to simulate the entire terminal

and approach maneuvering task required of an actual lifting body
returning from space.

The HL-10 will use the 8,000-pound-thrust XLR-ll rocket

engine, built by Reaction Motors Division of Thiokol Chemical
Corp., Denville, N.J., which powered the X-1 research airplane
past the speed of sound in 1947.

The fcur-barrel engine burns ethyl alcohol-waer mixture

and liquid oxygen propellants. For the initial powered flights,
only two chambers will be used, producing half "thre available
thrust.

The basic design features of the HLE-10 were developed by

NASA's Langley Research Center, Hampton, Va. The craft was
built by Norair Division of the Northrop Corp., Hawthorne,

Calif.

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