How advanced is SR-7 1 Blackbird?

The fastest manned aircraft and missiles in history are hard to catch. How advanced is SR-7 1 Blackbird?

How fast is the fastest manned plane SR-7 1 Blackbird in history? How did it ignore all missile attacks? SR-7 1 reconnaissance plane, nicknamed Blackbird, is a jet long-range high-altitude high-speed strategic reconnaissance plane used by the US Air Force. SR-7 1 reconnaissance plane adopted a lot of advanced technologies at that time and was the first practical jet plane to successfully break through the thermal barrier. None of the actual combat records were shot down by enemy planes or anti-aircraft missiles.

The development of SR-7 1 reconnaissance plane began in 1963, and it was developed and produced by the Skunk Factory of Lockheed Company of the United States. 1964 first flight, 1966 in service, * * * produced 32 aircraft. 1990 retired, SR-7 1 partially returned to the army on 1995, 1997 launched the mission. 1998 retired permanently, and some of them are displayed in the museum. Only one SR-7 1A and one SR-7 1A are used in the Dryden Flight Research Center of NASA.

93% of the fuselage of SR-7 1 reconnaissance plane is made of titanium alloy, which can withstand the aerodynamic friction temperature of 230 degrees, and the temperature around the engine nozzle is as high as 5 10 degrees. However, at the peak of the Cold War, the CIA secretly set up many shell companies to buy these titanium from the Soviet Union, the largest titanium exporter at that time. Lockheed used various feasible camouflage methods to prevent the Soviet government from knowing the purpose of these titanium. In order to reduce the cost, they used titanium alloy which can be softened at lower temperature and processed more easily. The finished aircraft will be painted dark blue (close to black) to enhance the cooling and camouflage effect of high-altitude thermal radiation. When the plane flies at the speed of three times the speed of sound, the friction with the air will generate a lot of heat, and some parts of the plane will even be heated above 540℃, and black paint can help SR-7 1 reduce the temperature.

SR-7 1 can cruise at an altitude of 25900 meters. Although many jet planes can climb above this altitude through extreme climbing, they can't cruise at this altitude, which is twice the highest flying altitude of conventional passenger planes like SR-7 1. Due to lifting body design, SR-7 1 can provide lift at high altitude with thin air without large wingspan. After supersonic speed, the whole fuselage can be completely hidden in the shock wave generated by the nose, further reducing the drag and ensuring that blackbirds can cruise at supersonic speed.

SR-7 1 is designed to have a very small radar reflection cross section, which is an early stealth design. However, the high-temperature engine will exhaust, even if the fuel interferes with the radar with cesium, there is still temperature, so even if stealth technology is used in large quantities, blackbirds have huge infrared characteristics and sounds when flying at high speed, which are completely invisible. SR-7 1 is one of the biggest targets on the long-range radar of the Federal Aviation Administration. It can be traced hundreds of nautical miles away, not to mention the enemy country. Collecting intelligence overhead is an insult to any country, especially Russia and North Korea. Although the reconnaissance operation in the United States is carried out in secret, the temperature in many parts of the plane can reach 900 degrees, and it keeps emitting heat. You should know that the American plane is overhead, but the troops below are completely helpless. SR-7 1, which has been wagging around the world with the enemy for more than 30 years, successfully got rid of thousands of interceptions and attacks on it, most of which came from aircraft and air-to-air missiles of the former Soviet Union, because its speed and altitude were three times higher than those of commercial flights at that time.