Re: Lockheed B-12?

From: Pat Flannery (flanner_at_daktel.com)
Date: 07/13/04 

Date: Tue, 13 Jul 2004 15:05:20 -0500

OM wrote:

>What I'm
>presenting is the facts about the Habu and its predecessors as I know
>them, and regretfully the B-12 variant she claims was actually built
>never got off the paper it was proposed on.
>

When they designed the RB-12, they intended to us low weight (around 400
lb.) nuclear weapons in it, drooped from a rotary system in a
cylindrical bomb bay; in at least one design study this bomb bay was
mounted on the aircraft's centerline. And the thought was that if
properly done this wouldn't interfere with the aircraft's fuel
capacity, speed, or stealth.

>* A-1 thru A-5: Believed to be predecessor concepts to Lockheed's
>OXCART proposals. Little has been revealed about them, although some
>rumors persist that the A-1 may have been the designator for a study
>of how to fix all the problems associated with Lockheed's previous
>attempt at high-altitude LOX-fueled
>

LH2 fueled.

> high-Mach flight, the CL-400
>SUNTAN, a project that is still considered one of the Skunk Works'
>very few embarassing failures.
>

There were three separate design series studies going on under three
different code names: "Gusto", "Arrow", and "Archangel"
Gusto was subsonic stealth flying wing to replace the U-2, and resembled
a boomerang; "Arrow" was a extremely high Mach design resembling the
Convair "Kingfish" designs and had internal motors; "Arrow 1" had a
design resembled "Have Blue" in that it had a highly swept straight
delta leading edge. "Arrow" seems to morph into some of the "A" series
of designs that lead up to the A-12, particularly the A-6.
 

>
>* A-6: Rumored to have been internally designated as either ANGEL
>

"Angel" is the U-2. "Seraphim" is the...never mind....

 

> or
>SWIFT ANGEL internally by Lockheed. Mid-phase design for OXCART
>submission, actually about half the size of what was actually
>submitted.
>

This appears to be the "Archangel"s main internal competition; the
outgrowth of the "Arrow" series of designs that use internal motors for
propulsion; it, like "Arrow 1", appears to be twin engined.

> Only two photos of this design have surfaced. One in an
>_Air Farce_ magazine article on the Habu's retirement which showed a
>model next to the A-12 model that Kelly Johnson is always shown with
>in the declassified film footage where he's in a board meeting
>explaining what this Buck Rogers thingamabob is and will do. The other
>appears to be from the same set of shots, only showing the A-6 by
>itself. Appears to have been either a single or double engine vehicle,
>with engines internal instead of mounted out on wings. Some have
>likened the general shape to that of the Testors' F-19 stealth design
>that sold like hotcakes until the Nighthawk was finally revealed to
>the world.
>
>
>* A-7 thru A-10: Same as with A-1 thru A-5. Rumors have it that the
>A-9 was the first to put both engines out on the wings. No pictures to
>this date have been released, at least not that I've come across.
>Internal designations may or may not have been ANGEL variations.
>

Okay, there is "Archangel 1" which has twin underwing engines mounted
close to the body on a delta wing with clipped tips;
"Archangel II" uses four engines; a pair of afterburning turbojets
mounted halfway out an a somewhat diamond-shaped wing and a pair of pure
ramjets on the wingtips.
A-10 uses twin underwing mounted motors in rectangular boxes with added
radar-deflecting "facets" on delta wing; underside of body is made up of
flat plate surfaces like "Have Blue", and apparently has the shape of an
inverted triangle. Front of fuselage appears to widen to generate body
lift to make up for far aft mounted delta wing.

 

>
>* A-11: Also known as ARCHANGEL. This was Lockheed's internal
>designation for the initial proposal submitted to the CIA for
>consideration as a candidate for OXCART. Only difference from the A-12
>are some streamlining and tweaking to reduce the radar crossection
>characteristics.
>

 Original A-11 design has diamond-shaped wing with twin motors slung
underneath it about a third of the way from fuselage to tip. There are
photos or drawings of all the ones I've described in Jay Millers "Skunk
Works", which was the official history of the design group, written with
the aid of Lockheed.

>* RB-12: Recon bomber variant proposed by Lockheed following the F-12B
>rejection. Actually reached mockup stage and change orders for tooling
>had been approved prior to Air Force rejection and project
>cancellation. Intended for use with a D-21 variant designed to carry a
>1MT nuclear warhead.
>

The variants in Miller's book use internal bomb bays, not the attack drone.
Also, the timings off on this, as the "Tagboard" D-21 program doesn't
get started until October 10th, 1962; whereas design work on the bomber
variant of the A-12 gets started on September 14th, 1960, over two years
earlier

>
>* RS-12: A proposed strike variant submitted at same time as RB-12.
>Cancelled at same time. No known mockups made.
>
>* B-12 / B-71 / SB-12: Proposed dedicated bomber variants, also
>submitted same time as RB-12 and RS-12 variants. Rejected at same time
>as well. Bomb payloads would have either been deployed using D-21
>drone variants and/or from internal payload bays as designed for
>YF-12A use. Again, no mockups for these variants, but I still chuckle
>at the prospect of what would have happened if the latter of these
>three had been built, and announced by LBJ in the same way he
>announced the RS-71 :-)
>

Good one, Centurion!
And now, the question of the week- since the Air Force has developed the
bay and trapeze gear to launch missiles at Mach 3 via the YF-12, and
since the SR-71 incorporates the the four chine bays that can have
different sensor installed in them, as well as the interchangeable noses
with different sensors, exactly how many hours of work does it take to
hang two to four small bomb bays in where the chine bay sensors were,
stick a mission-optimized nose on it for strategic attack, and turn it
into a Mach 3 "Silver Bullet" strategic attack bomber that has a very
good chance of getting through the Soviet defense screen?
The cost of this added capability would not be very much overall, and
I'm willing to bet that Kelly made a pitch in this regard; whether the
Air Force took him up on it is a very good question. Me, I'd have gone
for it in a minute. And that would neatly explain why the SR-71 would
keep getting called back from the edge of retirement as it's recon
mission was supplanted by spysats....because recon wasn't _all_ it could
do. In fact it's final retirement comes at the around the same time our
new "Silver Bullet", the B-2 Spirit, starts to enter service.
   
Pat

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