NASA M2-F1

The NASA M2-F1 was a lightweight, unpowered research aircraft built to test the lifting body idea, a wingless shape whose fuselage alone produces enough lift to glide to a controlled landing. The concept came out of work at the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics in the 1950s and was meant to let a spacecraft return from orbit and land horizontally. In 1962 managers at NASA's Dryden flight research centre approved a cheap prototype: a tubular steel frame built by NASA craftsmen, covered in a handmade mahogany plywood shell made with the Briegleb Glider Company, for a budget of about 30,000 US dollars. Its rounded shape earned it the nickname flying bathtub. Testing began in April 1963 with the craft towed across Rogers Dry Lake behind a modified Pontiac convertible, then moved to air tows behind a NASA R4D, the Navy name for the Douglas DC-3, with release at 12,000 feet from August 1963. Pilots including Milt Thompson, Bruce Peterson and Chuck Yeager flew it until 1966, for more than 400 ground tows and 77 air tow flights. It proved that wingless shapes could be flown and landed, which led to the heavier metal Northrop M2-F2 and HL-10 and influenced the Space Shuttle. The surviving aircraft, N86652, is displayed at the Air Force Flight Test Museum at Edwards Air Force Base in California.