X-9 Shrike - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The Bell Aircraft Corporation X-9 Shrike was a prototype surface-to-air

Surface-to-air missile

A surface-to-air missile or ground-to-air missile is a missile designed to be launched from the ground to destroy aircraft or other missiles...

, liquid-fueled guided missile

Guided Missile

Guided Missile is a London based independent record label set up by Paul Kearney in 1994.Guided Missile has always focused on 'the underground', preferring to put out a steady flow of releases and developing the numerous GM events around London and beyond....

that was a testbed for the nuclear-armed GAM-63 RASCAL

GAM-63 RASCAL

The GAM-63 RASCAL is a supersonic Air-to-surface missile that was developed by the Bell Aircraft Company. The RASCAL was the United States Air Force's first nuclear armed standoff missile. The RASCAL was initially designated the ASM-A-2, then re-designated the B-63 in 1951 and finally re-designated...

. It is named after the bird

Bird

Birds are feathered, winged, bipedal, endothermic , egg-laying, vertebrate animals. Around 10,000 living species and 188 families makes them the most speciose class of tetrapod vertebrates. They inhabit ecosystems across the globe, from the Arctic to the Antarctic. Extant birds range in size from...

shrike

Shrike

Shrikes are passerine birds of the family Laniidae. The family is composed of thirty-one species in three genera. The family name, and that of the largest genus, Lanius, is derived from the Latin word for "butcher", and some shrikes were also known as "butcher birds" because of their feeding habits...

.

Thirty-one X-9 rockets were delivered, flying from April 1949 to January 1953. The program was used to gather aerodynamic and stability data, and to test guidance and propulsion systems.

None of the missiles survived testing. The only known remaining fragment of an X-9 is part of a vertical stabilizer

Vertical stabilizer

The vertical stabilizers, vertical stabilisers, or fins, of aircraft, missiles or bombs are typically found on the aft end of the fuselage or body, and are intended to reduce aerodynamic side slip. It is analogical to a skeg on boats and ships.On aircraft, vertical stabilizers generally point upwards...

, at the Larry Bell Museum in Mentone, Indiana

Mentone, Indiana

Mentone is a town in Harrison and Franklin townships, Kosciusko County, Indiana, in the United States. Mentone is the self-proclaimed "Egg Basket of the Midwest" because of prolific commercial egg production in the area, and holds an Egg Festival annually in early June to celebrate its heritage...

Specifications (X-9)

General characteristics:

Length
Length
In geometric measurements, length most commonly refers to the longest dimension of an object.In certain contexts, the term "length" is reserved for a certain dimension of an object along which the length is measured. For example it is possible to cut a length of a wire which is shorter than wire...

: 22 ft 9 in (6.9 m)

Wingspan
Wingspan
The wingspan of an airplane or a bird, is the distance from one wingtip to the other wingtip. For example, the Boeing 777 has a wingspan of about ; and a Wandering Albatross caught in 1965 had a wingspan of , the official record for a living bird.The term wingspan, more technically extent, is...

: 7 ft 10 in (2.4 m)
Diameter
Diameter
In geometry, a diameter of a circle is any straight line segment that passes through the center of the circle and whose endpoints are on the circle. The diameters are the longest chords of the circle...

: 1 ft 10 in (0.56 m)

Wing area: 70 ft² (6.5 m²)
Weight (empty): 2,125 lb (964 kg)
Weight (loaded): 3,500 lb (1,588 kg)
Propulsion
Air propulsion
Air propulsion is the generation of thrust during flight by an aircraft or a creature such as a bird, bat or insect.-Aircraft:An aircraft propulsion system must serve two purposes. First, the thrust from the propulsion system must balance the drag of the airplane when the airplane is cruising...

: Bell XLR65-BA-1 liquid-fuel rocket engine, 3,000 lbf (13.3 kN) thrust

Performance:

Maximum speed
Speed
In kinematics, the speed of an object is the magnitude of its velocity ; it is thus a scalar quantity. The average speed of an object in an interval of time is the distance traveled by the object divided by the duration of the interval; the instantaneous speed is the limit of the average speed as...

: Mach
Mach
Mach may refer to:* Mach , a lunar crater* Mach disk, diamond pattern seen in rocket exhaust* Mach number, a measure of speed* Gillette Mach3, a manual razor with three blades* Mach bands, an optical illusion...

2.0
Range
Range of a projectile
right|thumb|250 px|The path of this projectile launched from a height y0 has a range d.In physics, assuming a flat Earth with a uniform gravity field, a projectile launched with specific initial conditions will have a predictable range. As in Trajectory of a projectile, we will use:The following...

: 50 mi (80 km)
Service ceiling
Service ceiling
With respect to aircraft, a ceiling is the maximum density altitude an aircraft can reach under a set of conditions.The word ceiling can also refer to the height of the lowest obscuring cloud layer above the ground.-Service ceiling:...

: 12.3 mi (19.8 km)
Rate of climb
Rate of climb
In aeronautics, the rate of climb is an aircraft's vertical speed - the rate of change in altitude. In most ICAO member countries , this is usually expressed in feet per minute and can be abbreviated as ft/min. Elsewhere, it is commonly expressed in metres per second, abbreviated as m/s...

: m/min ( ft/min)
Wing loading
Wing loading
In aerodynamics, wing loading is the loaded weight of the aircraft divided by the area of the wing. The faster an aircraft flies, the more lift is produced by each unit area of wing, so a smaller wing can carry the same weight in level flight, operating at a higher wing loading. Correspondingly,...

: kg/m² ( lb/ft²)
Thrust/weight:

Specifications (X-9)

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