Rocket-powered aircraft
Rocket planes can achieve much higher speeds than similarly sized jet aircraft, but typically for at most a few minutes of powered operation, followed by a gliding flight.
Many rocket aircraft may be drop launched from transport planes, as take-off from ground may leave them with insufficient time to reach high altitudes.
[12] The first rocket plane ever to be mass-produced was the Messerschmitt Me 163 Komet interceptor, introduced by Germany towards the final years of the conflict as one of several efforts to develop effective rocket-powered aircraft.
[13] The Luftwaffe's first dedicated Me 163 fighter wing, Jagdgeschwader 400 (JG 400) was established in 1944, and was principally tasked with providing additional protection for the manufacturing plants producing synthetic gasoline, which were prominent targets for Allied air raids.
Having a much larger size than any other rocket-powered endeavor of the conflict, the Silbervogel antipodal bomber spaceplane was planned by the Germans, however, later calculations showed that design would not have worked, instead being destroyed during reentry.
[19] After considerable effort, it successfully established its own production capability, which was used to produce a limited number of its own copies, known as the Mitsubishi J8M, which performed its first powered flight on 7 July 1945.
[21] The Japanese also produced approximately 850 Yokosuka MXY-7 Ohka rocket-powered suicide attack aircraft during the Second World War, a number were deployed in the Battle of Okinawa.
Postwar analysis concluded that the Ohka's impact was negligible, and that no U.S. Navy capital ships had been hit during the attacks due to the effective defensive tactics that were employed.
[24] Similarly, the Messerschmitt Me 262 "Heimatschützer" series used a combination of rocket and jet propulsion to allow for shorter take-offs, faster climb rate, and even greater speeds.
[29] Amongst these experimental aircraft were the North American X-15 and X-15A2 designs, which were operated for around a decade and eventually attained a maximum speed of Mach 6.7 as well as a peak altitude in excess of 100 km, setting new records in the process.
The rocket was the main engine for delivering the speed and height required for high speed interception of high level bombers and the turbojet gave increased fuel economy in other parts of flight, most notably to ensure that the aircraft was able to make a powered landing rather than risking an unpredictable gliding return.
[31][32] One design was the Avro 720, which was primarily propelled by an 8,000 lbf (36 kN) Armstrong Siddeley Screamer rocket engine that ran on kerosene fuel mixed with liquid oxygen as the oxidizing agent.
[33] Work on the Avro 720 was abandoned shortly after the Air Ministry's decision to terminate development of the Screamer rocket engine, allegedly due to official concerns regarding the practicality of using liquid oxygen, which boils at -183 °C (90 K) and is a fire hazard, within an operational environment.
The propulsion system of this aircraft used hydrogen peroxide as a combined fuel and oxidiser, which was viewed as less problematic than the Avro 720's liquid oxygen.
[44] According to author Michel van Pelt, French Air Force officials were against a pure rocket-powered flight but favoured a mixed-propulsion approach, using a combination of rocket and turbojet engines.
While the Société d'Etudes pour la Propulsion par Réaction (SEPR) set about developing France's own domestic rocket engines, the French aircraft manufacturer SNCASE was aware of the French Air Force's keenness for a capable point defence interceptor aircraft, and thus begun work on the SNCASE SE.212 Durandal.
[44] On 2 March 1953, the first prototype Trident I conducted the type's maiden flight; flown by test pilot Jacques Guignard, the aircraft used the entire length of the runway to get airborne, being powered only by its turbojet engines.
In the early 1960s, American research into the Boeing X-20 Dyna-Soar spaceplane was cancelled due to lack of purpose; later the studies contributed to the Space Shuttle, which in turn motivated the Soviet Buran.
Another similar program was ISINGLASS which was to be a rocket plane launched from a Boeing B-52 Stratofortress carrier, which was intended to achieve Mach 22, but this was never funded.
The 8.7-meter-long plane has a wingspan of 2.5 meters and it is a part of development of the larger, future Tianxing-I-1 vertical takeoff, horizontal landing reusable launch vehicle.
