Please let me remind all of you--this material is copyrighted. Though partially funded by NASA, it is still a private site. Therefore, before using our materials in any form, electronic or otherwise, you need to ask permission.
There are two ways to browse the site: (1) use the search button above to find specific materials using keywords; or,
(2) go to specific headings like history, principles or careers at specific levels above and click on the button. 
Teachers may go directly to the Teachers' Guide from the For Teachers button above or site browse as in (1) and  (2).

BELL X-1

The first manned aircraft to exceed the speed of sound (approximately 760 miles per hour at sea level) in level flight was the U.S. Air Force X-1 rocket plane, the first of which was constructed in late 1945 by the Bell Aircraft Corporation.

The bullet-shaped X-1 was a single-seat, lowing monoplane with a length of 31 feet and a wingspan of only 28 feet. Power was supplied by a Reaction Motors RMI-6000C4 rocket engine with four rocket tubes producing 1,500 pounds of static thrust each. As there was no way to throttle the rocket engine, speed was controlled by firing one, two, three or all four tubes. At full power, the engine burned so much fuel that flight endurance of the alcohol/liquid oxygen-powered X-1 was only 2½ minutes.

During the 1940s, when the Bell X-1 was under development, the problems encountered in propelling aircraft at and beyond the speed of sound seemed almost insurmountable. The use of advanced technologies in aerodynamics, metallurgy and structural engineering was required to break the so-called sound barrier. During World War II pilots of high-speed fighter planes often found their aircraft violently buffeted and their controls rendered useless when in a steep dive. These pilots had encountered a mysterious invisible wall of resistance which later became known as the sound barrier.

When a conventional propeller-driven aircraft approaches the speed of sound the very bulk of the aircraft and propeller themselves cause the air in front of the plane to build up. But when a highly streamlined, thin-winged rocket or jet-powered aircraft reaches the sound barrier, it pierces it easily, actually splitting the air apart with a thunderclap--or sonic boom--that can be heard as much as 60 miles away.

That phenomenon first occurred in controlled level flight on October 14, 1947 when a Bell X-1 was dropped from the belly of a modified B-29 bomber at 30,000 feet over Muroc Dry Lake, California. At the controls was a much-decorated World War II fighter pilot, Air Force Captain Charles E. Yeager, Yeager attained a speed of Mach 1.04, or 964 miles per hour--more than 300 miles per hour faster than the speed of sound at that altitude.

The preceding information was extracted from the pamphlet,
"The Great Airplanes Sterling Silver Miniature Collection", published by The Franklin Mint, 1979.
Permission was granted to ALLSTAR by The Franklin Mint to use the preceding materials. 
ALLSTAR maintains the copyright for the format in which the material is presented.

Send all comments to allstar@fiu.edu
© 1995-2008 ALLSTAR Network. All rights reserved worldwide.

Funded in part by

Used with permission from The Franklin Mint

Updated: March 12, 2004