XV-15 litho - NASA's History Office

Figure 41.
Simultaneous static test firing
of XV-15 ejection seats.
(Ames Photograph
AC75-1602)
48
cockpit by a rocket fired by a crew
member activated ignition system. The
inclusion of these seats dictated several
aspects of the cockpit design. The
seats had to be oriented to allow
simultaneous ejection of the pilot and
copilot with adequate clearance from
the instrument panel, center console
and side panels, and the overhead window
frame had to be large enough to
permit the seat and crew member to
pass through without interference. In
addition the flexible oxygen and communication
lines had to have breakaway
fittings to permit separation
upon ejection.
To verify the operation of these ejection
seats in the XV-15 cockpit, a
functional test was conducted using
the forward section of the N703NA
fuselage, fabricated by Rockwell
International at their Tulsa, Oklahoma,
site. The test would determine if a
simultaneous (pilot and copilot) seat
ejection could be safely performed. Shorty Schroers was the principal
Government investigator for this evaluation and Rod Wernicke, brother of Bell
Program Manager Ken Wernicke, was the test director for the contractor.
Two 95 percentile (large-size) anthropomorphic test dummies were dressed in
flight suits and helmets and strapped into the seats. The cockpit interior structure,
control panels, and windows were marked with a pattern of various colors and
shades of lipstick so that any contact made by the simulated pilot and copilot
with the aircraft would be identified by the transferred markings. One of the project’s
more unusual moments was when Schroers and his team of engineers and
technicians went to a local cosmetic store to purchase the large quantity of lipstick
required for the test, being careful to select as many distinguishable colors
and shades as they could find. It is hard to imagine what the salesperson must
have been thinking.
In July 1975, the forward fuselage section mounted on a flatbed truck was moved
to the designated test area at the Tulsa International airport. An array of still- and
movie-cameras were set up around the site and two high-speed cameras were
mounted inside the cabin to capture the ejection in slow motion. Aerial movies of
the test were taken from a helicopter piloted by Ron Erhart, Bell’s XV-15 chief
test pilot. Figure 41 shows the nearly simultaneous ejection just after both seats