The Original Skunk Works – Nickolas Means | The Lead Developer UK 2017

Having spent a forty year career in aeronautical engineering at Lockheed, 30+ of those years at Skunk Works, I must say I am truly impressed with this presentation. He actually gets the history correct, something that often doesn't happen when outsiders talk about these things. The P-80 was before my time, but I worked on the other aircraft mentioned here, and quite a few others. I realize Mr. Means is primarily trying to make a motivational presentation here - but his Skunk Works history stands on its own as being worthwhile.

I made many of the components for these planes. It was both exciting and strange working with the Skunk Works. Your right about how they kept information simple. Manufacturing information was always done on hand drawn blueprints (sometimes with very funny notes- that you would never see on BAC, LAC, GD, DAC, etc drawings). Many times a RFQ would be hand delivered Friday morning, accepted by lunchtime and the structural component made overnight (sometimes 2-3 'overnights), picked up by a follow-up person (LAC Union had a big problem with this) and on the flight line Sunday Morning for testing, R/R,etc. One had to have a lot of corporation from other vendors especially when the part had to be rushed through processing, ie mag./penetrant inspect, alodine, x-ray, primer/paint, Heat Treat, Chrome Plating , etc.- otherwise could take many days /weeks. If you were a manufacture vendor/supplier for the Skunk Works you probably worked with a whole variety of materials. Sometimes with Stainless Steels, 4000 Series Steel, 7000 Series AL, Elgi Alloy, Mp35n, and always a lot of Ti 6AL-4V. I remember making some specialized components out of this green plastic called Floro Green. Soft and flexible but would wear a cobalt/carbide tool out in a instant if you thought it was just plastic. Of course since this was all 'black-box' stuff, blue print title/ description information was removed or cut-out of the blue print. And sometimes it would appear like 'swiss cheese' since there were so many 'holes' in it. But whether it was for SR-71, U-2, F-117, etc. sometimes you could tell where the component was going on the aircraft because of the design. I remember that I was almost arrested after telling a Skunk Works Rep. that "this 'bulkhead part' was missing a dimension".....And he said "Who told you where this went??" And then proceeded to read me the US Governments Riot Act. If You know anything about aircraft/aerospace design/structures, many times you can almost guess where that component goes to. Anyway it was a much different time than Aircraft/Aerospace manufacturing today.

I once told my flight instructor after a preflight inspection... "That plane is leaking oil" He said, "good... if it's not leaking oil, its out of oil."

Lockheed made some of the most beautiful American aircraft of the 20th century.... and I even include the F-117. I was already in love with the SR-71 before having a solid understanding of engineering as a young child. When I got around the age of 10-11 years old I was starting to grasp some of the engineering, and then got to see the SR-71 in person, in Texas. The SR-71 is burned into my mind and is my absolute favorite aircraft of all time.

Great presentation. One correction to Mean’s presentation. The reason for the partially filled fuel tanks on the SR-71 at time of takeoff is not due to any issue with the insufficient lift profile due to fuel weight; the reasons for the partially filled fuel tanks is threefold: (1) reduced weight to reduce tire blowout risk during takeoff when 400+ psi tires are still in contact with the ground, (2) the emergency brake procedure issues, & (3) during first inflight refueling the complete replacement of ambient atmosphere with gaseous nitrogen to serve as a volubility buffer best happens when the SR-71 has the most space available for refueling. In other words, the SR-71 can easily attain lift at full gross weight; there are other considerations involved that mandate the partially filled fuel tanks. Anyway, great presentation. Mr Means skunkworks management advice is now scaled to a cross institutional framework in the GitHub world, noting that GitHub itself is an organization with which he is now affiliated and employed.

As a CNC programmer & machinist in the aerospace industry, this was an amazing history lesson. This is the type of educational material that should be mandatory. I love learning about the accomplishments of the machinists and engineers who first started working with heat resistant super alloys such as Titanium-6Al-4V and Hastelloy-X. There were so many gems hidden in this magnificent presentation. I was absolutely fascinated about the problems they didn't solve, hacking their way around the rest, and ultimately still achieving success! Mind blowing <3

One of the "best" talks that I've heard and seen in my almost eight decades of life. One of my Minuteman Missile squadron commanders in the seventies had been an SR-71 pilot.

Fantastic listening. The engineers in the late 50's and 60's...geniuses, with sliderules!!

"Hey, Vsauce, plane Michael here." For real though, this guy's presentations are excellent.

He really should start a YouTube channel where he just talks about airplanes.

What he is advocating is basically the polar opposite of every single book written for executives and business management types since the 1980s. That's why you don't see these sorts of ideas very often in organizations, they're quite radical. The idea of hiring good people and trusting them to do good work is at odds with the goal of most management methodologies to reduce every business practice to a checklist so that employees can be disposable and wages kept low. That's why the Skunkworks had to be a special part of Lockheed Martin and not just another department, with lots of other Skunkworks departments all over the company. Those management techniques were built for an economy where the primary business activity was manufacturing. The Skunkworks projects were almost entirely mental work, engineering and design, not assembly-line repetitive labor. They might be a great model for how to handle most business now, since mental work is the primary business activity and responds so poorly to having manufacturing-era ideas applied to it. You will have a very hard time convincing the MBAs holding the purse strings of this, however, as it goes against quite literally everything they've ever been taught.

"we can't see the stealth plane because the pole is more visible" - "hold my beer while i design a half million dollar stealth pole" :'D

WOW. I was riveted to the screen watching and listening to this speech. Totally fascinating!

Here is a man who wants to talk about airplanes, and somehow shoe-horned a motivational speech into it.

This is an odd error, given that he's addressing a British audience: the Canberra that flew the photorecon mission over Kapustin Yar was not a Martin B-57, but an English Electric Canberra (built under license by Martin as the B-57) flown by the RAF. It did leave from an American airbase in Germany, and landed safely in Iran after being peppered by cannon shells from MiGs.

Best, most interesting, and enlightening aeronautical talk I have heard in 49 years in the industry! Great job!

Wow... I stumbled upon this video and have sat here the entire time mesmerized. Fantastic presentation !

I got to see this plane fly over my car on my way home thought the rice fields in northern California near Beal airforce base like one or two times a week!!! I use to pull over to watch it!! Awesome!! Thats all I can say. I am so excited for the SR72!!!!

I can't get enough Skunkworks footage and info...these guys were legends. History Channel just did a 2 hour documentary.

At first, I didn't noticed the length of the video. I thought I've been watching some short clip about some Lockheed's department. When I finished watching, I wasn't able to comprehend how much time past... It was the best 53 minutes I've ever watched!