NASA X-38 - Development

Development

X-38 was the program under leadership of NASA Johnson Space Center to build a series of incremental flight demonstrators for the proposed Crew Return Vehicle. In an unusual move for an X-plane, the program involved the European Space Agency and the German Space Agency DLR. It was originally called X-35. The program manager was John Muratore, while the Flight Test Engineer was future NASA astronaut Michael E. Fossum.

The X-38 design used a wingless lifting body concept originally developed by the U.S. Air Force in the mid-1960s during the X-24 program, and it was Muratore's brainchild.

The X-38 program used unmanned mockups to test the CRV design. The flight models were:

• X-38 V-131
• X-38 V-132
• X-38 V-131R, which was the V-131 prototype reworked with a modified shell
• X-38 V-201, which was an orbital prototype to be launched by the Space Shuttle
• X-38 V-133 and V-202 were also foreseen at some point in the project but were never built.

The X-38 V-131 and V-132 shared the aerodynamic shape of the X-24A. This shape had to be enlarged for the Crew Return Vehicle needs (crew of seven astronauts) and redesigned, especially in the rear part, which became thicker.

The X-38 V-131R was designed at 80 percent of the size of a CRV, and featured the final redesigned shape (Two later versions, V-133 and V-201, were planned at 100 percent of the CRV size). The 80% scale versions were flown at 15,000 to 24,000 pound weight. The X-38 V-201 orbital prototype was 80 percent complete, but never flown.

In tests the V-131, V-132 and V-131R were dropped by a B-52 from altitudes of up to 45,000 ft (13,700 m), gliding at near transonic speeds before deploying a drogue parachute to slow them to 60 miles per hour (97 km/h). The later prototypes had their descent continue under a 7,500-square-foot (700 m2) parafoil wing, the largest ever made. Flight control was mostly autonomous, backed up by a ground-based pilot.

The X-38 project cancellation was announced on April 29, 2002 due to budget concerns.

The X-38 V-132 is now on permanent loan from NASA to the Strategic Air and Space Museum at Ashland Nebraska.

As of November 2009, the 80% complete X-38 V-201, having been moved out of "Hangar X" at Johnson Space Center- is now sitting under a blue plastic tarp outside the Media Resource Center (Building 423) at Johnson Space Center, Houston

As of November 2010, the X-38 V-131R is on loan from NASA to the Evergreen Aviation Museum in McMinnville, Oregon.