Word: x
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...wheels touched at howling speed, throwing the rubber off their nylon tires and the X-3 shot for miles across the level lake...
...Good attitude, Bill," he said. "You've got eight feet [off the runway]. Let her down a little more. You've still got eight feet." Slowly the speeding X-3 sank down toward the speeding ground. "Five feet," said Yeager. ". . . One. Now hold her right there. Nice job. The runway is clear for seven miles ahead...
Slanting swiftly down toward the great brown lake, the X-3 wobbled a little...
...speed, they stir up too much drag. So the tiny wings of the X3, designed for efficiency and minimum drag at very high speed, make the ship unstable and cranky when it is flying below the speed of sound. This is one reason why Bill Bridgeman quietly denounced the X-3 as a "nasty little beast." When he does, one of the Douglas designers retorts: "What do you expect? The X-3 wasn't built to hover...
...problems involved were staggering. Aluminum alloys lose much of their strength at 300° F., so large parts of the X-3's skin, especially parts that get heat from the engines as well as from outside, are made of titanium. The cabin, which must be kept at a temperature where a man can sit, is cooled by a refrigerator powerful enough to air-condition an average movie theater. The refrigerator accounts for 10% of the empty weight of the X3, and absorbs 2,600 horsepower from its engines. Despite all this cooling, the windows of the cockpit (which...