Castle Air Museum's Hustler is the seventh example to roll off North American's production line in Fort Worth, Texas. A pre-production airframe, YB-58A-1-CF 55-0666 flew for the first time on March 20th, 1958. As it's type prefix suggests, this Hustler served as a test aircraft with Convair, which fitted a YJ79-GE-5 jet engine on a special centerline pod. On November 8th, 1958, the aircraft flew for 32 minutes at a sustained Mach 2 velocity with its YJ79-GE-5 engines. On April 29th, 1959, the U.S. Air Force formally took '666 on strength, but the airframe remained with Convair for test and evaluation purposes. On May 1st, 1959, Convair converted the Hustler into YRB-58A configuration.
Castle Air Museum's Hustler is the seventh example to roll off North American's production line in Fort Worth, Texas. A pre-production airframe, YB-58A-1-CF 55-0666 flew for the first time on March 20th, 1958. As it's type prefix suggests, this Hustler served as a test aircraft with Convair, which fitted a YJ79-GE-5 jet engine on a special centerline pod. On November 8th, 1958, the aircraft flew for 32 minutes at a sustained Mach 2 velocity with its YJ79-GE-5 engines. On April 29th, 1959, the U.S. Air Force formally took '666 on strength, but the airframe remained with Convair for test and evaluation purposes. On May 1st, 1959, Convair converted the Hustler into YRB-58A configuration.