NASA’s X-59 quiet supersonic analysis plane efficiently accomplished a essential sequence of exams through which the airplane was put by way of its paces for cruising excessive above the California desert – all with out ever leaving the bottom.
“The thought behind these exams is to command the airplane’s subsystems and flight pc to operate as whether it is flying,” mentioned Yohan Lin, the X-59’s lead avionics engineer at NASA’s Armstrong Flight Analysis Heart in Edwards, California.
The purpose of ground-based simulation testing was to verify the {hardware} and software program that may permit the X-59 to fly safely are correctly working collectively and capable of deal with any sudden issues.
Any new plane is a mix of programs, and figuring out the little changes required to optimize efficiency is a vital step in a disciplined method towards flight.
“We thought we would discover just a few issues through the exams that may immediate us to return and tweak them to work higher, particularly with among the software program, and that’s what we wound up experiencing. So, these exams have been very useful,” Lin mentioned.
Finishing the exams marks one other milestone off the guidelines of issues to do earlier than the X-59 makes its first flight this 12 months, persevering with NASA’s Quesst mission to assist allow industrial supersonic air journey over land.
In the course of the testing, engineers from NASA and contractor Lockheed Martin turned on many of the X-59’s programs, leaving the engine off. For instance, if the pilot moved the management stick a sure method, the flight pc moved the plane’s rudder or different management surfaces, simply as it could in flight.
On the identical time, the airplane was electronically related to a floor pc that sends simulated alerts – which the X-59 interpreted as actual – akin to modifications in altitude, pace, temperature, or the well being of assorted programs.
Sitting within the cockpit, the pilot “flew” the plane to see how the airplane would reply.
“These have been easy maneuvers, nothing too loopy,” Lin mentioned. “We’d then inject failures into the airplane to see how it could reply. Would the system compensate for the failure? Was the pilot capable of get better?”
Not like in typical astronaut coaching simulations, the place flight crews have no idea what eventualities they may encounter, the X-59 pilots largely knew what the plane would expertise throughout each take a look at and even helped plan them to raised give attention to the plane programs’ response.
In plane improvement, this work is called “iron chicken” testing, named for a easy metallic body on which representations of the plane’s subsystems are put in, related, and checked out.
Constructing such a testbed is a standard follow for improvement packages through which many plane will probably be manufactured. However because the X-59 is a one-of-a-kind airplane, officers determined it was higher and cheaper to make use of the plane itself.
Consequently, engineers dubbed this sequence of workout routines “aluminum chicken” testing, since that’s the metallic the X-59 is usually manufactured from.
So, as a substitute of testing an “iron chicken” with copies of an plane’s programs on a non-descript body, the “aluminum chicken” used the precise plane and its programs, which in flip meant the take a look at outcomes gave everybody larger confidence within the design,
“It’s an ideal instance of the previous tried and true adage in aviation that claims ‘Check what you fly. Fly what you take a look at,’” Lin mentioned.
With aluminum chicken testing within the rearview mirror, the subsequent milestone on the X-59’s path to first flight is take the airplane out on the taxiways on the airport adjoining to Lockheed Martin’s Skunk Works facility in Palmdale, California, the place the X-59 was constructed. First flight would comply with these taxi exams.
Already within the X-59’s logbook because the totally assembled and painted airplane made its public debut in January 2024:
- Testing the plane’s potential to take care of a sure pace whereas flying, basically a verify of the X-59’s model of cruise management.
