Re: How did you pick your avatar?
For real SoulWinner.<br /><br />Grumman built (2) X-29 Technology Demenstrators in the late 1980's.<br /><br />They are essentialy, Grumman F-9 Panther fuselages fitted with the forward sweeping wings, amoung many other modifications, powered by the same GE jet engine used in the F-16 Falcon.<br /><br />The first X-29, was just used to prove it's flight worthyness.<br /><br />The second X-29, which is the plane I worked on, was used for every other conceivable test they could throw at it.<br /><br />The aircrafts where considered extremely stabile, in almost any condition, except in the event of a computer failure. A failure in the cumputer systems onboard, will result in a loss of the aircraft, as the planes inherant instability, can only be corrected by the computers, making as many as 50,000 corrections per second, to flight control surfaces.<br /><br />Truly is an amazing aircraft.<br /><br />NASA and DARPA still fly X-29 #2, at Edwards Air Force Base, California.<br /><br />The most amazing thing about these aircraft, is their fuel effeciency, which will propell forward swept wing technology into the commercial aircraft industries in the comming decades, all thanks to the Grumman X-29.<br /><br />
<br /><br />This is a pic of X-29 #1, at sunset, on the tarmac at the Navel Weapons Depot, Calverton, NY (Grummans Final Assembly Plant) just prior to shipment to Edwards AFB.<br /><br />The F-14A, A+, and D's
, A-6E's
, and EA-6B
were also pretty neat planes too!<br /><br />Heres a neat link too!<br /><br />
http://www.dfrc.nasa.gov/Newsroom/FactSheets/FS-008-DFRC.html
