Boeing Bird of Prey

Very interesting plane, but why did they stop the project? it would have made for a very interesting fighter.

Falcon out...

The Bird of Prey was Never ment to be a fighter. It was built as a technology demonstrator.

See the Thread on stealth demonstrators HERE

Tim

then why don't they use it as a recon plane

Falcon out...

Because there are already UAVs that can do it fine, that are stealthy, with long range. There are multiple "black" UAV programs out there.

The Bird of Prey was used to develop technolgy with applications for future fighters, recon platforms, and UAVs. You can see some of this technology applied to Boeing's UCAV designs.

The Bird of Prey was never meant to be a viable system in and of itself. While it looked really cool, it had only marginal flying qualities. It had just enough performance to provide the data required from the test program.

Actually the bird of prey design was far better than just required. The plane used hidraulic controls instead of fly by wire and it could fly. That means that contrary to such designs as the F-117 as a plane it can 'fly' on its own without abandoning stealth...

Yeah, it could fly, but the handling qualities were marginal.

The designers used conventional controls (instead of fly-by-wire) as a cost savings. Despite this handicap, the program produced the desired results.

It was a bold and innovative project.