Wednesday, December 23, 2009

And More Aerodynamics

More pictures of aerodynamic testing anyway. I added some shots of the Calspan model in its various configurations to "MLAS Photos" along with some pics taken during tests in the University of Washington Aeronautical Laboratory (UWAL) tunnel and the NASA Langley Research Center Vertical Spin Tunnel (VST). The UWAL model was a 7.4% aluminum reproduction of the FF and CM used to test separation dynamics, while the VST model was a 3.5% plastic model of the FF we used to test free-flight, turnaround, and drogue chute characteristics. The video below is of the VST model under test.



And on the subject of videos, several MLAS flight videos were posted within the last couple of days at the NESC website. You'll find a link here and to the right. The videos taken by the various on-board cameras are posted there along with a single-screen, time-correlated composite of all the key flight and ground-based cameras. Those files are enormous but well worth the time it takes to download ... just be patient.