Dreamchaser would already have been flight tested into space had NASA funded it all along. They funded crew Dragon (which has worked fine for some time now) and Starliner (which has yet to complete its first manned test flight, despite having almost twice the funding).
NASA's process of picking "winners" was apparently to fund the "old space" capsule, and the capsule from among the "new space" entries, not believing any new space outfit could build a space plane (because of "not invented here" attitude). Definitely not the NASA of the 1960's. And you can blame incompetent Congressional micromanagement for that.
GW
]]>https://nextspaceflight.com/launches/details/7363
National security: China warns military buffs not to photograph classified equipment
https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politic … -equipment
China's space plane apparently deployed 6 'mysterious wingmen' in orbit
https://www.space.com/china-space-plane … ry-objects
HL-20 Personnel Launch System: The Canceled NASA Space Plane Reborn as Dream Chaser
]]>Nice to see the level of backup planning during the Apollo days!
And! Particularly good to see that the saved museum exhibit was useful for planning design of Orion.
(th)
]]>I read a decent amount of science fiction, and no one (to my recollection) has constructed a story around such a theme. There have been lots of stories which feature recovery from system failures of various kinds, but all (again, that I know of) involve survival of a ship.
Here's a real one. Apollo Rescue Capsule
Various Star Trek episodes and movies involve destruction of a ship, people leaving in escape pods. Star Wars episode IV (A New Hope) was the first movie. It included droids leaving for the planet in an escape pod. And the book "Starship Troopers" by Robert A. Heinlein featured paratroopers deployed from orbit. (The movie was, uh, different to put it politely.)
]]>Thanks for both examples !!!
It seems to me that MOOSE has a future as one of a variety of solutions for safe return from orbit, although the notes indicate that at the time of the drawings, a significant amount of work needed to be done.
It took hundreds of years for lifeboats for ocean going ships reached the present state of survivability. We've already seen one example (Shuttle) where a life saving apparatus for individuals would have been useful (if the damage to the wing had been known).
As rapid deployment options continue to develop on a number of fronts (for military needs in particular) we may see a point at which individual recovery systems for space travelers can be deployed to any orbit within hours.
I read a decent amount of science fiction, and no one (to my recollection) has constructed a story around such a theme. There have been lots of stories which feature recovery from system failures of various kinds, but all (again, that I know of) involve survival of a ship.
(th)
]]>also Encyclopedia Astronautica: MOOSE (Man Out Of Space, Easiest)
Note: MOOSE had a heat shield. It was folded sections that were unfolded by hand before inflating MOOSE. I don't see a heat shield on FIRST, but it was a Rogallo wing. Early development of Gemini tried to use a Rogallo wing, but they found the inflated support structures folded under load; it failed.
]]>Any chance you could find out a bit more about the inflatable concept for return from orbit?
I recall from recent posts a comment or observation that a light but large object might survive encounter with the upper atmosphere. For example, the Echo balloon (which did NOT survive) was 30.5 meters in diameter. Per the Wikipedia article on Project_Echo, it had a mass of 71+ Kg.
The satellite was NOT designed to survive de-orbit, but I'm wondering if a large balloon (of some kind) might survive.
For example, if the balloon were to roll as it encountered the atmosphere, could it radiate heat while in the side opposite to the heating.
(th)
]]>I posted design studies over at "exrocketman" about a folding straight wing spaceplane, and a pivoting straight wing spaceplane. These were feasibility-of-concept studies, not detailed design studies. Yet the significant issues to address are apparent. I pointed these out explicitly in the later pivot-wing study.
One of the two differences between bringing a cylindrical body back through reentry dead broadside versus 40-ish degrees angle of attack is that the effective ballistic coefficient is lower if dead broadside. That lowers peak heating at the cost of higher airloads over most of the windward surfaces (wings cannot take that and be light enough to fly).
The other difference is complicated aerodynamics (with hypersonic heating risks) at angle of attack, and very simplified low-risk (for heating) aerodynamics if dead broadside.
To go dead broadside, you have to stow the wings out of harm's way, and you have to reconfigure (and partially stow) the tail surfaces to be consistent with that flight attitude.
I repeat: the presence of wings on a spaceplane does not (repeat NOT !!!) eliminate the need for windward-side heat shielding. Whatever Musk might have tweeted about such is nonsense. He ought to ask his reentry aerodynamics people before he opens his mouth about that.
GW
]]>The Soviets were highly creative and innovative. Their aerospace engineers were consummate professionals. What their concepts lacked in technical refinements, often taken to absurd extremes in the west in my opinion, was more than made up for in terms of general utility and simplicity. Some of what they created was still more advanced than what existed in the west. I can also appreciate their ability to "think big".
I often wonder what we could achieve together if we stopped playing these pointless geopolitical games with each other. After the better part of a century of poking each other with pointy sticks, that sort of behavior has achieved a lot of nothing. I marvel at how capricious and petty politicians can be. When Putin and Trump are gone, there's still hope.
]]>Perhaps a hydraulically deployable wing technology similar to the type of wing used by Boeing's GBU-39 would permit a progressive increase in the applied aero loads rather than a single traumatic deployment event.
Spiral was a lifting body with deployable wings. During development of the Russian space shuttle Buran, they flew an unmanned mockup of Spiral to test the heat shield. It was called "unmanned test article", in Russian the acronym was BOR. BOR-4 splashed in the Indian ocean, Australian intelligence got pictures of it while floating. That gave them density vs water, and centre of gravity. HL-20 was based on it, with modifications. Dream Chaser is based on HL-20. BOR-4 and later had fixed wings, but the original Spiral had deployable wings.
Click image for website of NPO Molniya, the Russian company that developed Spiral. "Directly from the horse's mouth."
Perhaps a hydraulically deployable wing technology similar to the type of wing used by Boeing's GBU-39 would permit a progressive increase in the applied aero loads rather than a single traumatic deployment event.
]]>