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Built and designed in the 1960s after the A-12 Oxcart, the SR-71 Blackbird is still the fastest, most vanguardist air-breathing airplane in the history of aviation. These once classified photos reveal how Lockheed built both birds in secret, in California. They look taken at the Rebel base in Hoth.

"Everything had to be invented"

The A-12 and the SR-71 were a completely different design from anything else before it—and everything after, as time has demonstrated. At the time, many of the technologies needed to make these airplanes were considered "impossible." And yet, thanks to Kelly Johnson and the amazing team at engineers and scientists at Lockheed’s Skunk Works, they were invented from scratch—in twenty months.

According to Lockheed Martin’s official account, Kelly Johnson—the engineer who made the A-12 Oxcart and the SR-71 Blackbird—"everything had to be invented. Everything." From the The Pratt & Whitney J58 engines—a technological feat still unsurpassed by today’s mass manufactured airplanes—to its titanium skin—capable of surviving temperatures from 315C (600F) to more than 482C (900F)—and composite materials. Its landing gear, for example, is "the largest piece of titanium ever forged in the world." Ironically, the United States did not have enough titanium to build these airplanes, so they have to buy it from the Soviet Union. Imagine that: Buying the only material in the world that could make an spy plane from the country you wanted to spy.

Major Brian Shul, one of the SR-71 pilots and author of Sled Driver, tells more about the manufacturing process:

Lockheed engineers used a titanium alloy to construct more than 90 percent of the SR-71, creating special tools and manufacturing procedures to hand-build each of the 40 planes. Special heat-resistant fuel, oil, and hydraulic fluids that would function at 85,000 feet and higher also had to be developed.

Thanks to these technologies and his skills, Shul survived many surface-to-air missile attacks (check out this amazing story about how the Blackbird saved his neck over the skies of Libya.) No Blackbird was ever shot down.

These photos are a testimony to this amazing engineering and manufacturing feat:

Cutaway illustrations of the twin cockpit variant of the SR-71. Notice the inlet funnels that increased the air speed in front of the J58 engines.

Lockheed’s Skunk Works’s manufacturing plant in Burbank, California. Later, both the Oxcart and the Blackbird would be coated with an special black paint that reduced the temperature by 23C (75F) and had radar absorbing capabilities.

Notice the titanium panels forming the skin of these birds.

Only 50 Blackbird airframes were built. "The dies or molds were destroyed as directed by then Secretary of Defense McNamara to prevent any other nation from building the aircraft."

Final A-12 Oxcart ever produced: Article 133

Close up of one of the SR-71s in manufacturing

Another angle, from the other side

Production schedule for the SR-71

The J-58 engines

This is the exhaust of the J-58 engine. It could reach temperatures of 1760C (3200F).

The Blackbirds kept flying long after their retirement from the USAF. One of them stayed at NASA: Here’s a photo from the Armstrong Flight Research Center (then Dryden) of an SR-71 being retrofitted for test of the Linear Aerospike SR Experiment (LASRE).

The finished Blackbirds

And now more Blackbird porn because I know you love it

The analog cockpit was the only thing that, compared to the rest of futuristic technologies used in the Oxcart and Blackbird, seems completely out of place:

You can see it in ultra-high definition here. And get the explanation of how it works from a SR-71 pilot here.

One last factoid:

478 total people have flown the Blackbirds. More people have climbed to the top of Mount Everest than has flown this aircraft. Although a few Lockheed crewmembers were killed during the testing stages of the Blackbird, the U.S. Air Force never lost a man in the entire 25 years of active service. The SR-71 flew for 17 straight years (1972-1989) without a loss of plane or crew. Considering the environment the Blackbirds flew in, that is an enviable safety record.

According to Kelly Johnson, no SR-71 was ever touched by any of the more than 1,000 missiles launched at these birds since its first mission to 1981.

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Fascinating photos reveal how they built the SR-71 Blackbird

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It may look like the SR-71 Blackbird, but this sleek flying beast chained to the ground at the CIA’s headquarters in Langley, Virginia, is not the most famous supersonic spy plane ever created but its father, the A-12 Oxcart. In some ways, it was a better machine than the famous Blackbird.

Here are the specs (many of these remain officially secret, but everyone assumes they are fairly accurate):

	A-12 Oxcart	SR-71A Blackbird
Maximum Speed	Mach 3.35 at 85,000′ (Estimated)	Mach 3.2 at 85,000′ (Estimated)
Max. Ceiling	95,000 feet	85,000 feet
Max. Range	2,500 miles	3,250 miles
Wing Span	55.6 ft.	55.6 ft.
Wing Area	1,795 sq. ft.	1,795 sq. ft.
Length	98.75 ft.	103.8 ft.
Empty Weight	60,000 lbs.	67,500lbs.
Gross Takeoff Wt.	120,000 lbs.	152,000 lbs.
Sensor Payload	2,500 lbs.	3,500 lbs.

The key difference between the A-12 Oxcart and the SR-71 Blackbird was the payload and the unrefueled range. The Blackbird could carry a lot more at the same time across a longer distance, as it was revealed in this comparison between the two machines, declassified in 2012:

While the A-12 had to swap payloads between missions, the SR-71 could carry these sensors at the same time, as DefenseTech summarized back in 2012:

• two "technical objective cameras"
• two "operational objective cameras"
• one "terrain objective camera"
• one "high resolution" side-looking radar
• one infrared camera
• one electronic and communications intelligence-gathering package
• three electronic warfare (countermeasures) systems, "CFAX, APR 27 and System 13C"

There were some design differences too. Check out the extra window on the cockpit of the SR-71 compared on the background to the A-12 on the foreground:

The engines on the SR-71—the Pratt & Whitney J58—were also more powerful than the Pratt & Whitney J75 on the first five A-12 Oxcarts. The following A-12s used the J58 too.

The story of the A-12 is the beginning of the SR-71

The story of this Mach 3.2 technological wonder starts in 1957 and, like all secret flying things full of gadgets, it’s fascinating.

The OXCART program story began in 1957, when a contractor suggested that high-altitude supersonic flight was the only way to avoid Soviet air defenses. The CIA’s Richard M. Bissell, who was directing the 1954 U-2 spy plane program at the time, was concerned about their vulnerability to USSR radars and anti-air missiles. He was right: in 1960 the Soviets shot down Francis Gary Powers’ U-2 near Sverdlovsk.

By then the A-12 program was already under way: after Lockheed Aircraft completed "antiradar studies, aerodynamic structural tests, and engineering designs," the CIA gave the green light to produce the 12 aircraft on January 30th, 1960. It was still called the A-11 at the time and Lockheed engineer Clarence L. Johnson was the main designer. He also was responsible for the U-2 but, for some reason and after months of drawings and wind-tunnel model testing, people were still not convinced this beast could fly.

It did, but only after years of tests and adjustments. It was a difficult path. The aircraft skin, for example, had to made out of a titanium alloy, as it had to resist 550 degrees Fahrenheit temperatures while flying at top speed. The aircraft manufacturing process, which at that point only used aluminum frames, was an absolute nightmare. All machinery broke trying to work the titanium and new tooling parts had to be designed and created from scratch. As a result, each plane had to be hand-crafted.

The quest to make its radar signature was also painful. For one year and a half, a full- scale model of the plane manufactured with new radar-absorbent materials was tested. Sitting on a pylon in a secret base and after countless adjustments, it was discovered that adding some big metallic parts to each side of the fuselage reduced the radar footprint. Johnson thought it was going to harm the aerodynamics but, in later flight tests, it was clear it helped the lift. It was all part of the quest for radar invisibility but, years later, these features were used by Lockheed in other supersonic designs. As a result of all these changes to its original design, the plane got its final designation: the A-12.

A cockpit hell

The interior of the plane was also quite problematic: For reasons of weight, the plane had to be constructed without almost no thermal insulation, converting the cockpit into a true oven. As a result, the pilot had to use an astronaut-like suit with its own refrigeration system. And probably Clint Eastwood’s Firefoxy asbestos underpants too. Pilots would typically lose up to 5 pounds in a four hour flight.

Even the runway had to be specially created for the OXCART program. The initial test ground strip at a secret location in the Nevada desert (the CIA document doesn’t mention it but it was probably Area 51) was only 5,000 feet long and incapable of supporting the weight of the A-12. Great for for UFO landings, but it needed pouring 25,000 yards of concrete to achieve the necessary strength and 8,500-feet length necessary for the A-12’s take-off and landing.

However, at the end everything was solved and the pilots, who had to be six feet tall, under 175 pounds and come with The Right Stuff were selected: William L. Skliar, Kenneth S. Collins, Walter Ray, Lon Walter, Mele Vojvodich, Jr., Jack W. Weeks, Ronald "Jack" Layton, Dennis B. Sullivan, David P. Young, Francis J. Murray, and Russell Scott were the heroes’ names, chosen to test this wild beast.

Inverted A-12 being prepared for radar testing in Area 51

On April 26th 1962, the A-12 took to the skies. Louis Schack piloted it during its first 40-minute unofficial maiden flight. Four days later, he also took her into its official maiden flight for 59 minutes. It wasn’t until May 4th that the A-12 broke the sound barrier for the first time, reaching Mach 1.1. During 1962 the aircraft kept evolving during flight testing but it wasn’t until 1967, after countless delays caused by political discussions and a couple of accidents, that the A-12 was employed in real missions. The target: Vietnam.

The first mission was flown on May 31st 1967 and it accomplished all objectives. The A-12 force kept flying successfully, but was retired in 1968, when the SR-71 Blackbird took its place. Of the final 15 A-12s produced by Lockheed, five were lost and two pilots were killed. It may seem like not a lot was achieved, but this aircraft pushed the envelope in every way imaginable making many of the common concepts of modern supersonic aviation possible, from aerodynamic design to life support systems an specially manufacturing processes.

As Ken Collins —one of its pilots— said during the recent unveiling ceremony by the CIA at Langley: "It was a beautiful airplane, it was a beautiful airplane to land, and just technically a fantastic airplane to fly."

And indeed, it was.

Ten planes survived the 15-plane OXCART program, one of which you can see on the deck of the USS Intrepid in New York City.

This is a version of a story that ran on September 21, 2007.

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The story of the ultrasecret A-12 Oxcart—father of the SR-71 Blackbird

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Any bowling pros would like to comment?

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Definitely a good resource to bookmark, in addition to the 500 free programming books you can grab from GitHub.

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