PILOT QUESTIONNAIRE

Flight 1-53-86 Pilot: Maj. R. Rushworth

I. PRELAUNCH AND LAUNCH PHASE

A. Evaluate briefly flight performance of the following items during the prelaunch period and/or the launch maneuver. 1. Pressure suit operation - I had a blowout in the thumb of my glove.

2. X-15 radios - were good except from launch to shortly after burnout. I think it was some interference that we can't account for.

3. APU's - ran good - no problem.

4. Damper System - seemed to be normal.

5. Flow-Direction Sensor - for what I could determine was good with the exception of the alpha cross bar on the attitude indicator which didn't work at all.

6. Launch space positioning - I thought we launched a little long. I had lost site of Delamar at launch.

7. Launch transients - normal transients at launch. The usual roll off to the right.

8. Engine start - was normal

9. Unforeseen incidents - none there, with the exception that one of two things, either the airplane is slightly out of trim directionally or the sideslip indicator was misaligned. I suspect a little of both.

II. BOOST PHASE A. Evaluate flight performance in the following areas, during the "power on" portion of the flight.
1. Engine operation - seemed to be normal as far as I can tell, until burnout where we got 81 seconds instead of 79. "Did you get a low thrust?" Apparently a little low thrust, yes.

2. q control - was good, theta vernier was real good.

3. Low a control - Alpha control was OK all the way, but had what appeared to be a mismatch between zero degrees alpha and zero g. I think the g meter was on the accurate side indicating less than zero g because I felt it. I got the sensation of being less than zero g before I even looked at the instrument so I would say that the g meter was giving me a better presentation than the angle of attack at the time.

4. Altitude profile versus simulator - would have been a little bit closer had I maintained zero g rather than shooting for the zero angle of attack. "Was alpha low or high?" Alpha was reading high. When I got down I knew that I was less than zero g because I could feel it. I was still 1° angle of attack and I never did get on to zero g until I got full speed out. At 4000 fps I got it back to zero g. I did hear NASA-l call at that time that I was going a little bit low. I do get a transient with putting speed brakes out. "Pitch change?" Pitch changed down. But you shouldn't see it that quick at that point. It has to have started down earlier. "From your pushover, you went right on down?" Yes, 1/10 of a g less than zero.

5. Unforeseen incidents - none other than the angle of attack not being a good presentation.

III. GLIDE PHASE A. Evaluate flight performance in the following areas during the "power off" portion of the flight.
1. Burnout transients - none at all. It just shutdown real smooth. Somewhere in this time period, about three times, I got strange vibrations that didn't upset the airplane. I felt them but I couldn't tell that it moved the airplane. I just felt the vibrations, high frequency. "Like the stabilizer shaking?" Yes. The only other thing that I could say, I got a lot of continual bangs that might of had some import to it. There were a couple of times that I felt the vibration that I didn't hear the bangs. "Did you see the hydraulic needle moving?" I wasn't watching hydraulics then. The airplane seemed to be very loose in roll and this would be the only time that I could have said that the airplane had a little bit of out of trim condition. The dutch roll type damping was very very low. "Dampers on?" Dampers on. "Do you know what Mach number?" Four (4). At nine degrees angle of attack. I gave the airplane little pulses and I didn't get much motion out of the airplane but it just seemed to be real close to neutral stability. It would wander a little bit and then it would stop, both in roll and yaw. It felt like I was on top of a ball again. "The brakes were closed?" Brakes were closed, yes. Sitting at 100,000 ft. there just didn't seem to be - I wouldn't really expect it to be much damping there either but it seemed to be low in damping. "No correlation between structural vibration?" No, as a matter of fact, I thought that there was a possibility that I had lost the damper. "Was it bad?" No, it wasn't bad, it just felt that I had lost something. "The q is a little lower than expressed on the simulator." Yes probably so. In pitch, I'll rate pitch as, right after burnout and for the next 30 seconds; pitch 3, roll 3, and sideslip 3. I would like to explain the rating of three in pitch. It takes a lot of trim, a lot of stabilizer, to get up from zero degrees angle of attack to 9° angle of attack and in the process of getting the airplane up there you can feel it going through good stability to neutral type stability. You can just feel the airplane getting into a worse stability range. "Lateral?" Yes. And the effort to get it up there is magnified because you are looking at the horizon and everything looks real level and then 10° angle of attack is a heck of a lot attitude change right there. It just feels uncomfortable to go up that 10°. The control part of it isn't difficult. It's just difficult to make you realize that you have got to get up there to do it. "Do you know if this is normal?" Yes, this is normal. It is very hard to pull the airplane up 10° because at the same time you can feel the effect of going up there, you feel it getting less stable. It seems to be less stable at 10° than it is at zero degrees. "What speed are you talking about here?" About Mach four, four and a half. It's a psychological rating, and you don't see this. "What kind are you going to give?" From M = 4 down to M = 2.5, I'll rate it 2, 3, and 3.

q 2 , f 3 , y 3 .

2. Glide energy management versus simulation - came out to be just about what I expected, under shooting. Was good.

3. Approach and landing - From M = 2.5 down to M = l I will rate it 2, 2, and 2. Subsonic with the dampers off I will rate 2, 3, and 3. "What dampers are you speaking of?" Roll and yaw dampers off. I turned the yaw damper off around 42,000 ft. Comparing this to the F-104 with just the yaw damper off, I would rate the X-15 as 2 and the F-104 at least 4. "Which mode, now?" Just directional. With the X-15 roll and yaw damper off going 35,000 ft. to 40,000 ft., I would rate that as 3 and 3, roll and yaw and I would rate the F-104 four or worse, four to four and a half. The X-15 is much more comfortable flying in these conditions than the F-104 is. "Did you do anything with the dampers off?" With the dampers off, I made some real quick inputs and all I can say was that the control was easier than with the dampers on. I didn't have any problem stopping it where I wanted to or getting the roll rates that I would like to see. The airplane has a little better roll rate, dampers off, than it does dampers on and the stability isn't bad enough to be of any concern. "Were these aileron pulses?" No, these were more motions, rolling up to an attitude and stopping it and rolling back.

4. Unforeseen incidents - Bob Harper asked me one day last week what turbulence felt like in the X-15. I said normally it was gone unannounced because you can't feel it. Today I got two real strong turbulence effects. One was about 10,000 ft. I called to the chase to see if that was turbulence and I got it again at 3,400 feet to 3,500, real strong turbulence. It felt, again, like this 13 cycle per second shudder. It was just like a machine gun going off. It didn't move the airplane at all. It didn't change anything, not even roll or directional control. It just felt like a vibration. "Did chase-4 confirm this?" After we got on the ground and got to talking about it, he said it was real heavy turbulence. "Would that have been what you said you got three times?" I don't think so because we don't get turbulence up there.

B. Describe and rate the most adverse piloting task experienced on this flight.

q 3 , f 3 , y 3 .

I would say the most difficult task was right after burnout and pulling it up to 8°. I was shooting for 8° angle of attack when I realized I was low so I went another degree to 9°. It is not adverse in that it is tough to do other than psychological, it looks like one big change and if you make that change it kind of expect the airplane to climb, "Big change in stabilizer required?" Stabilizer required and an attitude change. "You have already given us a 3, 3, and 3 rating." Yes. At touchdown when the nose came through I started the stick forward and it seemed like I was overpowering the hydraulic system. It seemed like I had gotten as far as the hydraulic system was going to go and I just had to wait for it to get any more.