Wingless Flight : The Lifting Body Story

A volume in the NASA (Nat. Aeronautics & Space Admin.) History Series; it tells the story of the most unusual flying machines ever flown, the lifting bodies. This story, filled with drama & adventure, is about the 12-year period from 1963 to 1975 in which 8 different lifting-body configurations flew. B. Dale Reed was the engineer who first presented the idea of flight-testing the concept to others at the NASA Flight Research Center. A lifting body is basically a wingless vehicle that flies due to the lift generated by the shape of its fuselage. Over those 12 years, Reed experienced the story as it unfolded day by day at the remote NASA facility northeast of L.A. in the Mojave Desert. Benefits from this effort immediately influenced the design & operational concepts of the winged NASA Shuttle Orbiter. The full benefits were realized in the 1990s when new spacecraft such as the X-33 & X-38 would fully employ the lifting-body concept. Illustrated with photographs & drawings.Reed, R. Dale is the author of 'Wingless Flight : The Lifting Body Story', published 2000 under ISBN 9780788189739 and ISBN 0788189735.