Jul 5 2003
From The Space Library
Armadillo Aerospace successfully carried out a milestone test of the company's candidate for the X-Prize, dropping the reusable suborbital spacecraft from a helicopter to demonstrate that they could recover the complete vehicle after flight. To conduct the test, the team placed 660 pounds (273 kilograms) of sandbags in the craft's cabin area, to simulate passengers, and mounted a set of five Olympic barbell plates, to simulate the weight of the engines, plumbing, and backup recovery system that the competitor's full-size vehicle would have. A helicopter towed and released the craft, the drogue immediately inflated, pulling out the main parachute. Nine seconds elapsed between release and full canopy inflation, causing a negligible shock of only two Gs. The team was expecting greater opening shock after high-altitude flights. Overall, the vehicle fared well~ the craft sustained minor damage to the vehicle's crushable nose cone, and none of the sandbags in the cabin ruptured. (Leonard David, “X-Prize Entry Undergoes Drop Test,” Space.com, 7 July 2003,http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technology/armadillo_test_030707.html (accessed 12 January 2009).
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