Development
Design work started in 1955 by Stanley Hiller Jr and Hiller Aircraft Corporation received a manufacturing contract and funding from the U.S. Air Force to build the only X-18 ever produced, serialled 57-3078.
To speed up construction and conserve money the plane was constructed from scavenged parts including a Chase YC-122C Avitruc fuselage, 49-2883, and the turboprops came from the Lockheed XFV-1 and Convair XFY-1 Pogo experimental fighter programs. The tri-bladed contra-rotating propellers were a giant 16 ft (4.8 m) across. The Westinghouse turbojet engine had its exhaust diverted upwards and downwards at the tail to give the plane pitch control at low speeds. Hiller nicknamed their X-18 the Propelloplane for public relation purposes.
Read more about this topic: Hiller X-18
Famous quotes containing the word development:
“Men are only as good as their technical development allows them to be.”
—George Orwell (1903–1950)
“The work of adult life is not easy. As in childhood, each step presents not only new tasks of development but requires a letting go of the techniques that worked before. With each passage some magic must be given up, some cherished illusion of safety and comfortably familiar sense of self must be cast off, to allow for the greater expansion of our distinctiveness.”
—Gail Sheehy (20th century)
“John B. Watson, the most influential child-rearing expert [of the 1920s], warned that doting mothers could retard the development of children,... Demonstrations of affection were therefore limited. “If you must, kiss them once on the forehead when they say goodnight. Shake hands with them in the morning.””
—Sylvia Ann Hewitt (20th century)