Upcoming Events

President's Message

Quick Links

Job Listings

SETP Foundation

 

Vision

To support the Society of Experimental Test Pilots by providing flight test education, mentoring our youth, promoting flight test safety, and preserving flight test history.

Mission Statement

The Mission of the SETP Foundation is:

Education

  • To provide flight test educational programs by sponsoring symposia and disseminating educational materials in order to increase the safety and efficiency of flight test and enhance the professional knowledge of test pilots, astronauts, cosmonauts and other aerospace professionals in the field of research and development.
  • To provide mentors for educating our youth, while encouraging them to enter flight test or an aerospace-related profession.

Flight Test Safety

  • To initiate and sustain a flight test related safety organization intended to promote flight safety, reduce the risk of mishap, promote risk reduction management and continually improve the profession's communication and coordination.
  • To develop, implement and maintain a computerized data base, readily available to all members and member organizations, containing flight test-related data collected from the industry.

History

  • To be the world’s leading source of history relating to test pilots and their profession.
  • To preserve the historical significance of the accomplishments of test pilots, the SETP, and the aerospace industry by displaying memorabilia, written and oral records, reports, photographs, video, and other artifacts.
  • To archive and display such history in a manner that supports and enhances the efforts of flight test education and flight test safety for current and future generations of flight test personnel and the general public.

Donations

pp-donate

 The SETP Foundation is a 501(c)(3) charitable organization, and all donations are tax-deductible.

image001ALL PROCEEDS BENEFIT THE SETP FOUNDATION!

 

“F-20 Tigershark”

By: Paul Metz

 

TO PURCHASE, CLICK HERE.  Please note in the “This donation is specified for” field the word TIGERSHARK

$50 + $8 shipping = $58 (for U.S. addresses only – if requesting shipping outside of the U.S., please contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.)

Once your donation is received, the book will be shipped within 3-5 business days via Media Mail

Synopsis: The F-20 was conceived as the next evolution of the Fighter for Export (FX), a concept that had been in place for over 50 years and a formalized U.S. government policy for over 25 years.  Northrop invested $1.2 billion of its own money on that policy.  However, no production contract followed, not because of any technical deficiency but because of a changing government policy on what our allies would receive in U.S. military aid.  

This book traces the development of the 3 generations of a 1955 design called the N-156 which became the T-38 and the F-5A/B.  The F-5A/B evolved into the F-5E/F and finally the F-20 Tigershark.   Each step in that progression was to keep up with the latest Soviet fighters.  The F-20 was designed to counter the Mig-29 and Su-27, 4th generation fighters.  The book reveals the unique design goals that produced a reliable, easily maintained, easy to fly, agile fighter-bomber that was affordable for many allied air forces in the wake of WW II.  The story is told from the first-person accounts (“Tigershark Voices”) of the struggles and triumphs to create a new type fighter in a world of increasingly complex, expensive and maintenance-intensive fighters.  Other “Tigershark Voices” bring the reader into the F-5 and F-20 cockpits as the pilots describe flying this breed of fighters.

This definitive Tigershark book features original documents and photographs, most in color and previously unpublished.   Original documents of USAF struggle to name the Tigershark the F-20, Presidential directives to build a fighter for export and limitations on sales, performance with no government funding are a few of the many examples of original documents pivotal to the F-20 story. 

Also included are the various F-20 follow-on proposals: RF-20A/B, F-20B/C/E/F and Lavi fighters. As with all Ginter books, the F-20 Tigershark also presents information of interest to the scale modeler.  

Beyond the detailed color photos, the book has many detailed factory drawings of the F-5 and F-20 with 3-views, cross section cuts and inboard drawings showing structure and equipment in great detail.   The cockpit comparison drawings are masterpieces of the graphic arts.

144-pages, 296 color photos, 20 b&w photos, and 135 illustrations.

 

 

Check Presentation to The Flight Test Historical Museum

On 23 October at the Gathering of Eagles event in Lancaster, CA, Art "Turbo" Tomassetti (F) and other past Presidents of SETP presented a check to The Flight Test Historical Museum for $100,000. Turbo noted "The flight test profession usually looks forward to the future with new technologies and new aircraft. The Society recognizes that we build that future on the foundations of the past, the things we have done and the things we have learned.  This museum will provide a place that will care for that past." This contribution is part of the Society’s pledge to the construction of the facility outside the gates of Edwards AFB, which will house The Bob Hoover Library, SETP Archives and a STEM Classroom.

Check 1

 L-R Past Presidents Roy Martin (F), Tom Morgenfeld (F), JB Brown (F), Steve Rainey (F)

 

 

Art Tomassetti (F) presents the check to The Flight Test Historical Museum's Art Thompson and Lisa BrownCheck 1

 

 

!--

Foundation Committees

-->