XCOR performance tested [with photo]

Valley Press on ^ | Friday, July 11, 2008. | ALLISON GATLIN

[BenLurkin]

MOJAVE - The typical sounds of jet and piston airplane engines at the Mojave Air and Space Port have been joined in recent weeks by a different kind of flightline noise: the roar and sudden quiet of a rocket engine. XCOR Aerospace has performed a series of flight tests of its second-generation rocket plane designed for the Rocket Racing League, demonstrating its capability to start and stop the engine as well as the airframe's aerobatic potential. The most recent aerial demonstration took place Thursday afternoon.

The airplane, a modified Velocity Aircraft kit airplane with a liquid oxygen- and kerosene-fueled rocket engine in the rear, can be seen spewing flames from the engine while airborne.

The racer is based on XCOR's earlier rocket plane, the EZ-Rocket. The world's first privately built, rocket-powered aircraft, the EZ-Rocket is a Long-EZ kit plane modified with twin 400-pound-thrust rocket engines instead of the usual engine and propeller.

The Rocket Racing League, often compared to "NASCAR in the sky," will play host to races of teams of such rocket planes flying an overhead circuit, starting and stopping their flame-producing engines as they soar and glide around the track.

[BenLurkin]

"FLYING HIGH - XCOR's experimental rocket plane is seen during a test flight Thursday over the Mojave Air and Space Port." BERNARD KANE/Valley Press

[Delta 21]

Rockets are cool!

[NormsRevenge]

Cool.

Let’s go racin; Boys ..
Boogity
Boogity
Boogity!