EC97-43901-3
This close-up of the stainless-steel Pegasus Hypersonic Experiment (PHYSX) Project’s experimental “glove” shows a highly reflective surface, underneath which are hundreds of temperature and pressure sensors that will send hypersonic flight data to ground tracking facilities during the experiment’s flight. The glove and the Pegasus rocket wing it is attached to were load-tested at Scaled Composites, Inc., in Mojave, CA, in January 1997. The Pegasus wing with attached PHYSX glove was placed in a wooden triangular test-rig, mounted to the floor atop the water bags. Technicians slowly filled water bags beneath the wing, applying the pressure, or “wing-loading,” required to determine whether the wing could withstand its design limit for stress.January 22, 1997NASA Photo / Tony Landis› Pegasus Project Description