NASA News Release 98-27
February 11, 1998

NASA and Lockheed Martin Tuesday saw their X-33 technology demonstrator move from drawing board to plant floor as the first major flight component arrived at the Lockheed Martin Skunk Works vehicle assembly facility in Palmdale, CA.

The 26-foot-long, 5,500-pound aluminum liquid oxygen tank that will form much of the nose and forward third of the X-33 vehicle arrived Tuesday afternoon by air from the Lockheed Martin Michoud Space Systems facility, New Orleans, LA.

"The arrival of the liquid oxygen tank marks the start of an ambitious assembly schedule that will see the X-33 vehicle roll out and begin flight tests within 18 months," said Jerry Rising, Lockheed Martin Skunk Works vice president for X-33/VentureStar.

"This is a significant achievement in making the X-33 vehicle ready for flight, as the liquid oxygen tank is the first major element to be placed into the assembly fixture," added Gene Austin, NASA X-33 program manager.

The tank, designed to hold more than 181,000 pounds of liquid oxygen, will supply the oxidizer needed to burn the vehicle's fuel, liquid hydrogen.

The liquid oxygen tank design also plays a key structural role in the X-33. It has a complex, two-lobed structure allowing for a close fit within the vehicle's outer shell. When filled, the tank will account for about 65 percent of total vehicle weight at liftoff.

The liquid oxygen tank design is one of a number of challenging technology areas that are key to the X-33, including the vehicle's two cutting-edge composite liquid hydrogen tanks, two linear aerospike engines, the vehicle's rugged metallic thermal protection system and advanced avionics systems, all of which will be arriving at the Palmdale facility during the coming year. Vehicle assembly is scheduled to be completed in late spring 1999, with the first flight, to be launched from Edwards Air Force Base, CA, scheduled for July 1999.

The wedge-shaped X-33 is a sub-scale prototype technology demonstrator leading to the next generation of commercially developed and operated single-stage-to orbit vehicles, flying after the turn of the Century, which could dramatically reduce the cost of putting payloads into space.