Skunk Works

Rating:
Summary: This book is Hard to Put Down
Review: If you like big engineering, technology, expionage, crazy military and business stories and the awesome achievements of the Skunkworks, this is the book for you. It has first hand coverage of the production of the U2, Blackbird and Stealth Vehicles. The author is easy to read and includes multiple sections with other peoples first hand accounts along with his own. This book also describes some of the thinking and principled approaches used by Ben Rich and Kelly Johnson in their operational management, project management and sales methods. Getting a glipse into the way the Skunkworks was run and how it adapted to a changing world is a great side benefit to the raw fun of reading this book.

Rating:
Summary: superb
Review: If you want a great read on U2's Blackbirds and Stealth, then THIS is the book...

Fascinating, well written, informative and a damned fine read.

Rating:
Summary: GREAT
Review: My first book in twenty years. Finished within a month. I'm not much of reader but this book caught my full attention and interest.

Rating:
Summary: Scintillating
Review: One of my english teachers once told me: Good books make you never want to put them down, great books are the ones in which you are so caught up in the story you never realize that you're reading. Rich's account lends the reader a unique perspective into the lives of many who worked heroicly behind the curtain of secrecy. A fabulous read!

Rating:
Summary: Required reading
Review: Rumor has it that "Skunk Works" is virtually required reading at the CIA. Author Ben Rich gives us an insider's account of what it was like to be a part of the famed Lockheed "Skunk Works" special team. The founding father was "Kelly" Johnson," who formed an elite internal technical group at Lockheed that enjoyed tremendous independence from company management and was able to conceive, design and build high performance aircraft. They produced the U2 spy plane, the SR-71 spy plane, and the stealth aircraft, to name but a few of their famous projects. Just the story behind the stealth design is worth the price of the book. It all started with an obscure article on "edge waves" by Pyotr Ufimtsev, a Russian scientist. Denys Overholser, a Skunk Works mathematician was able to wade through the abstractions and extract the key mathematical concept that led to the design of stealth aircraft. Years later Pyotr remarked that his Soviet senior designers had rejected his ideas.

In the later chapters Rich becomes somewhat bitter. We learn that "RS-71" had to be changed to "SR-71" because President Lyndon Johnson inadvertently interchanged the letters in a speech. This required modifying some 29,000 blueprints! He paints a dismal picture of how we design and build military aircraft today. Engineering used to be fun, it used to be interesting, but today it isn't. I agree with Rich. Finance and bureaucracy drives everything at large institutions.

Rating:
Summary: An Insiders Look at the Spy Business
Review: Skunk Works is an inside look at the Lockheed plant that built the U-2, SR-71, F117A Stealth fighter and other top-secret aircraft. Rich, as the former head of the Skunk Works, takes the reader through the entire process, from initial brainstorm to operational aircraft. Along the way he shows us the victories, pitfalls and bureaucratic redtape that pollutes the industry today. Skunk Works is an absorbing look at the covert side of military aviation long kept secret from the public. As a Vietnam vet who served with military intelligence, I always cringe when I read disclosures of top secret information. As a history and aviation buff, I find those same disclosures fascinating. Skunk Works is a fun read that takes full advantage of the end of the Cold War. It won't disappoint

Rating:
Summary: Awesome aerospace/military history
Review: Skunk works is the true story behind the coolest, high tech, top secret, aerospace engineering division operated by the Lockheed Martin corporation. Forged by legendary U. Michigan alumnus Kelly Johnson, the Skunk Works has created the coolest planes of recent memory, including the SR-71 Blackbird (currently visible on the flight deck of the Intrepid Aircraft Carrier in NYC), the F117A Stealth Fighter, and the U2 spy plane. The F22 Raptor and the Joint Strike Fighter are also creations of the Skunk Works, but are not covered in this autobiography written by the successor to Kelly Johnson, Ben Rich.
This quick read is well worth your while for a couple of reasons. First, the stories behind the creation of these planes is very interesting. For example, the Skunk Works engineers found the mathematical key to the stealth design buried within an obscure physics journal originally published in Russian. Oddly, the Russians military never capitalized on the principle, despite urgings from the article's Russian author. Furthermore, when the stealth plane was first designed and kept in a secret hanger infested with some bats, the bats couldn't detect the plane with their "sonar-like" sense, and they ended up crashing into it.
The book also makes for excellent military and therefore world history. Accomplishments of the U2 spy plane and the F117-A Stealth Fighter are covered in depth and literally changed the course of world events during the Cold War, the Vietnam War, the Korean War, the Gulf War, and other skirmishes. Many interesting, behind the scenes (formerly classified?) missions are also revealed in this book. Ben Rich also speculates on the future types of planes currently on the minds of engineers at the Skunk Works, and the implications will change how wars are fought in the future.
For readers who liked this book, NOVA recently published a video on the creation of the Joint Strike Fighter, a contract fought over between the Skunk Works and the Phantom Works of Boeing. These do all fighters are amazing, and this video is definately worth watching for those who enjoyed "Skunk Works."

Rating:
Summary: Awesome aerospace/military history
Review: Skunk works is the true story behind the coolest, high tech, top secret, aerospace engineering division operated by the Lockheed Martin corporation. Forged by legendary U. Michigan alumnus Kelly Johnson, the Skunk Works has created the coolest planes of recent memory, including the SR-71 Blackbird (currently visible on the flight deck of the Intrepid Aircraft Carrier in NYC), the F117A Stealth Fighter, and the U2 spy plane. The F22 Raptor and the Joint Strike Fighter are also creations of the Skunk Works, but are not covered in this autobiography written by the successor to Kelly Johnson, Ben Rich.
This quick read is well worth your while for a couple of reasons. First, the stories behind the creation of these planes is very interesting. For example, the Skunk Works engineers found the mathematical key to the stealth design buried within an obscure physics journal originally published in Russian. Oddly, the Russians military never capitalized on the principle, despite urgings from the article's Russian author. Furthermore, when the stealth plane was first designed and kept in a secret hanger infested with some bats, the bats couldn't detect the plane with their "sonar-like" sense, and they ended up crashing into it.
The book also makes for excellent military and therefore world history. Accomplishments of the U2 spy plane and the F117-A Stealth Fighter are covered in depth and literally changed the course of world events during the Cold War, the Vietnam War, the Korean War, the Gulf War, and other skirmishes. Many interesting, behind the scenes (formerly classified?) missions are also revealed in this book. Ben Rich also speculates on the future types of planes currently on the minds of engineers at the Skunk Works, and the implications will change how wars are fought in the future.
For readers who liked this book, NOVA recently published a video on the creation of the Joint Strike Fighter, a contract fought over between the Skunk Works and the Phantom Works of Boeing. These do all fighters are amazing, and this video is definately worth watching for those who enjoyed "Skunk Works."

Rating:
Summary: Excellent map of getting it done.
Review: The term "skunk works" was a term used by a Professor at MIT describing my method of accomplishing the impossible in record time. I did not understand the term until an engineer at GM told me that was a nick name at Lockheed. The book is spiritual in the doubts, accidental discoveries and hurdles jumped to be the successful elitist. A combination of tales outlines the element that has made the USA the most desirable place to live on earth.

Joe Anderson [e-mail]

Rating:
Summary: GREAT BOOK!
Review: This book gives a great example of what Americans can do if the governemnt keeps their noses out of it and let the people work! The Skunk Works was an outstanding organization which turned out outstanding aircraft. This book gives you the inside view from various points of view to show just how close things were to collapsing at times...either financially or physically. There is no way that this type of outfit could operate in this manner today and it is a shame. It shows what can be done when you let people be to do their job.