Author(s)

W.L. Richards

Abstract

A flight test article, called a glove, is required for a Mach-8 boundary-layer experiment to be conducted on a flight mission of the air-launched Pegasus® space booster. The glove is required to provide a smooth, three-dimensional, structurally stable, aerodynamic surface and includes instrumentation to determine when and where boundary-layer transition occurs during the hypersonic flight trajectory. A restraint mechanism has been invented to attach the glove to the wing of the space booster. The restraint mechanism securely attaches the glove to the wing in directions normal to the wing/glove interface surface, but allows the glove to thermally expand and contract to alleviate stresses in directions parallel to the interface surfac

Keywords