1/144 North American X-15 No.3 "Little Joe The II"

1/144 North American X-15 No.3 "Little Joe The II" Registration 66672 New Mold X-Planes Series The experimental X-15 built by North American Aviation was an astonishing craft. It was both an aircraft and a spaceplane, setting speed and altitude records at the edge of outer space in the 1960s. Such was its performance that some pilots could also hold claim to being astronauts. Even today, the hypersonic X-15 holds the record for the fastest ever manned rocket-powered aircraft at a top speed of Mach 6.32 (a staggering 7,274km/h). Latterly it was powered by a single XLR99 jet engine made by Reaction Motors Inc. To begin its flights, a NASA B-52 would carry the experimental craft aloft before releasing it at an altitude of approximately 14km. Three X-15 aircraft were manufactured and test-flown 199 times, thus creating invaluable data that would help future aircraft and space programs. Dragon Warbirds has produced a new 1/144 scale X-15 model that is different to all others that have gone before! This item represents the third prototype known as X-15-3 (serial no. 56-6672). The craft made 64 powered flights before it was tragically lost in an accident during Flight 191 on 15 November 1967. However, the Warbirds miniature represents X-15-3 as it appeared for pilot Joe Walker’s record-breaking Flight 91 on 22 August 1963. Walker was to reach an altitude of 108km, at the very edge of outer space. For that occasion the X-15 was decorated with nose art and the name “Little Joe the II”. This model captures perfectly the cylindrical form of the X-15 with its thick dorsal and ventral stabilizers. It also carries the correct NASA markings and the aforementioned nose art. It was extremely rare for research aircraft to carry nose art, so this makes the model even more distinctive.