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Project NATIV
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| Online Citations | Print Citations | Email citations |
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| Pictures | Personnel | Data |
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| RTV-A-3 | Holloman AFB | Peter Alway |
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"4. NATIV (June 1947 to 1948)
Survey for support facilities at Holloman began in June 1947. The launching tower was completed 20 September 1947, static firings started in January 1948 (Plate 2), and the first NATIV (North American Test Instrument Vehicle) was launched in May 1948. Field tests at Holloman ended with the fourth launching, which took place in November 1948. NATIV was primarily a research vehicle, but may also have been intended for short-range, surface-to-surface and surface-to-air ordnance delivery, according to a contemporary source (Ross 1951). North American Aviation was the contractor."
"The North American Aviation (NAA) NATIV, measuring 141/2 ft long with a diameter of 18 in., was capable of speeds up to Mach 1.2 and altitudes up to 60,000 ft, with a range of about 25 mi. NATIV was possibly powered by solid fuel and launched along a rail from within a 182-ft tower tilted at an angle of about 14-18 degrees. NATIV tests began at HAFB in 1948 and ended the following year; only about 6 of 20 launches were successful, according to William C. Strang, a former NAA employee in charge of ground instrumentation (Strang interview by George House, 1992)."
Reach for the Sky, The Military Architectural Legacy of Holloman Air Force Base; (also here & and here)
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Oral/Video History Collection: Interviews; 1930s- ;
This ongoing program includes interviews of individuals involved in early aerospace research and development in New Mexico (e.g., White Sands Missile Range, Holloman AFB, and New Mexico State University Physical Science Laboratory). Interviews are recorded on audio and video tapes. Transcripts are also available to researchers. Interviewees include:
[snip...]
William C. Strang (1920- ), NATIV Project
Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, U.S. Air and Space History Repositories
Contact:
Space Center, P.O. Box 533
Top of New Mexico Highway 200l
Alamogordo, New Mexico 88311-0533
(505) 437-2840
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Further info for William C Strang indicates he was/is with the British Aircraft Corporation & the Concorde.
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"Mr. Paul D. Castenholz is an independent consultant for many major programs and operations involving launch vehicles and space vehicles for both U.S. and European agencies and contractors. Mr. Castenholz first worked on rocket engines while at Rockwell International and was responsible for engine development of NATIV, Redstone, Jupiter, Thor, Atlas, Saturn/Apollo, and later, as a vice president, led the team that captured the Space Shuttle engine contract. Mr. Castenholz continued his career as president, BSP Division, Envirotech Corporation, and group president, Process Equipment Worldwide, Joy Technologies, until his retirement in 1989. Mr. Castenholz holds B.S. and M.S. degrees (University of California at Los Angeles) in mechanical engineering, and an A.M.P. degree (Harvard University, School of Business) in business. He has received NASA's Exceptional Public Service Apollo Program Award, and AIAA's Robert H. Goddard Award."
National Academy Press, Reusable Launch Vehicle, Biographical Sketches of Committee Members
Another page indicated the he might have been with of Rocketdyne, which I believe is now Boeing.
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May 26 [1948]: First North American NATIV missile launched at WSPG.
Aeronautics and Astronautics Chronology, 1945-49
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"Another post-war development was the formation of North American Aviation Missiles Division, originally the Missile Development Division, created for the Project NATIV experiments that NAA conducted in the late 1940s using captured German V-2 rockets. These experiments evolved into the X-10 program, the SM-64 Navaho and later the GAM-77 Hound Dog. In 1960, the Missile Division became the Space Division, which would lead North American to the Moon."
North American History - Post-War Developments
[Boeing Reusable Space Systems (RSS)] traces its roots to the start of guided missile studies at North American Aviation's (founded 1928) Los Angeles plant in 1945. Among the early programs we developed were the Navaho guided missile and X-10 test vehicle, NATIV test rocket....
Boeing: Reusable Space Systems Overview
Rocketdyne began work on the engine for the North American Test Instrumentation Vehicle (NATIV) to gather technical and engineering data for the Navaho. This required the acquisition of a remote test site, so a secluded area in California's Santa Susana Mountains became the country's first liquid-propellant high-thrust rocket engine test facility.
Boeing History, Rocketdyne Division
A tangent for Boeing/NAA leads to: North American History - The Beginning which contains no NATIV info but may be a lead. I've contacted the company historian at michael.j.lombardi@boeing.co to check for further info.
Another side trip to: NAA history pages, but only planes; NAA merged with Rockwell in 1967, but divested the missiles+ in 1996 to Boeing.
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The NATIV gets its name from its designation as "North American Test Instrument Vehicle" and it was designed and built by North American Aviation under contract for the U.S. Air Force. Development began in 1947 and the first tests were made late in 1948 or early in 1949.
CONSTRUCTION: It has a diameter of 18 inches and a length of 13 feet with a needle nose, four moveable fins and a liquid fuel rocket motor.
PERFORMANCE: In tests at Holloman Air Force Base near Alamogordo, New Mexico it attained a trajectory altitude of ten miles at "supersonic speeds."
PURPOSE: Not intended as a weapon, it was designed solely to "test vehicles for aerodynamic research" and "has contributed to the study of control systems for training rocket launching crews for the U.S. Air Force.
Folio: Recent Rockets. by Don Fabun
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Covered in association with the Navajo Project on Astronautix.
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