by Ken Schrock

September 16, 1998

Here's some of the different planes and projects I've worked on in my different jobs, chronologically:

When I first started at Point Mugu, I was assigned to work with the Stand-off Land Attack Missile (SLAM) team.  Our group wrote the test plans and were considered 'the' flight test engineer.  The Test Conductor spoke to the pilots, and the Test Conductor talked to us.  In other words, we were supposed to be the one voice representing all the engineer and program decisions.

There was some ship board launches, just to prove backward compatibility with the Harpoon that SLAM baselined from, but usually they were launched off of an F/A-18 or A-6.  This picture shows one of the launches from a Pacific Missile Test Center F/A-18.

I started learning about GPS for this program and also for the Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (old, non-PC name).  To tell war stories, we used to have to do prediction estimates to find when we'd have enough satellite coverage to be able to do a test because the GPS constellation wasn't complete.  A lot of good GPS information can be found at the US Coast Guard Navigation Center.

The Pioneer UAV always had lots of interesting short-term requests.  Within the first year out of school, I got to go back to my alma matter, Wichita State University, for wind tunnel tests.  These were to be used for a training simulator.  Once, instead of using the normal tracking radars, we convinced base security to give us a speed with their traffic radar gun for aerodynamic performance tests.  Due to several complications, we never got good data that way.

Teledyne Ryan Aeronautical Medium Range UAV gave me a taste of real time analysis in several different disciplines.  For one test flight, I got to ride a Huey (UH-1) as part of the vehicle recovery team.  The next flight I was watching the aerodynamic stability and control parameters (trailing edge which way was positive?).  For the third and fourth flights I watched the propulsion and recovery systems.

For comparisons of the different UAVS check this Office of Secretary of Defense comparison 

It's hard to see orange wires and boxes that are on the inside, but that's where you could see what I did as an Instrumentation Engineer.

The Flight Test Fixture on the F-15B and F836 was my first project at Dryden. In addition to getting the real time displays and processing ready for the control room, I did a lot of work with the post flight air data calibration equations.

I coordinated the Range Safety Flight Termination aerodynamic model for Pathfinder.  The whole idea that this thing can fly with just solar power is really intriguing.

My finale at Dryden was working the Uplink/DGPS for the X-33 RLV.  I know, a write up about this really should be at the space design team page.  FYI, if you were to see the vehicle in this attitude, you should be alarmed.  The vehicle is pointed somewhat below the horizon in a place where it should be going straight up.  To give the idea, there's the joke about a T-shirt that says, "I'm a bomb squad technician.  If you see me running, try and catch up."