Space Plane Concept Forgotten?

[redstone_1]

A few years ago, before Bush announced the plan to visit the Moon and Mars, NASA was already aware the aging shuttle would have to be replaced. I remember seeing 3d cgi of a delta shaped reuseable vehicle, that like the space shuttle would land on a runway. there was a speculative animation of it landing in a similar fashion on the surface of the moon though I dont' believe that was ever the intention. Its main advantage was a quick turnaround, it could be relaunched something like a month after landing. It was called something like the x-22 or the x-33 or something. Does anyone remember this vehicle? Has it been scrapped in favor of the "new" rocket system? What happened to this idea and when we do move to rockets only, will we have orbitors with a payload like the shuttle anymore?

 

[redstone_1]

Thanks!<br />I guess the question I'm more interested in is, have they scrapped it completely in lieu of the current moon ambitions?

 

[PistolPete]

Welcome to SDC. Let me give you the lowdown on the X-33. The X-33 was supposed to be a demonstrator for the larger production Venturestar that was supposed to replace the Shuttle. The Venturestar was going to be a single stage to orbit completley re-useable launch vehicle to launch satellites and payloads to the ISS. However, there were cost overuns, technical problems with the unusually shaped carbon composite fuel tanks, and engines that did not deliver as much thrust as origionally thought. In the end, there were so many problems that could not be easily overcome that the program was no longer economically feasable. Because of this, the program was cancelled in March of 2001.<br /><br />This being said, even if the Venturestar was a viable concept, and was put into production, you would still have to use capsules to get to the Moon. The Venturestar (and all spaceplanes, for that matter) are designed for Earth orbit. A spaceplane's heat shield is not the best shape for the high re-entry speeds and tempratures that are encountered with spacecraft returning from the moon. The blunt shape of the heat shield of a capsule is the perfect shape for taking on these kinds of temparatures. The complex shape of a spaceplanes heat shield causes hot points at certain areas like the nose, wing leading edges, and the tail. Also the extra weight of the wings, while usefull during re-entry from Earth orbit, become dead weight on the long trip to the Moon. Which means more fuel has to be used to lug a bunch of useless aluminum around the Moon, making the project even more expensive. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p> </p><p><em>So, again we are defeated. This victory belongs to the farmers, not us.</em></p><p><strong>-Kambei Shimada from the movie Seven Samurai</strong></p> </div>

 

[spacefire]

if the Venture Start were built, there would be a possiblity of building a space ferry from EO to lunar orbit and useing Venture Star to fly astronauts to the space ferry.<br />There might be an escape system tacked to the ferry which might be a capsule or another lifting body like the X-38.<br /> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p>http://asteroid-invasion.blogspot.com</p><p>http://www.solvengineer.com/asteroid-invasion.html </p><p> </p> </div>

 

[tomnackid]

The problem with any spacecraft that makes a runway landing is that the entire craft and mission end up being designed around that last five minutes of flight. The shuttle orbiter for example had to make many many compromises with cost, performance and even safety for the ability to land on a runway. For example its heat shield is much larger than the heat shield of a capsule and it is exposed throughout the entire flight. Because it is so large it had to be made from a very lightweight and, unfortunately, fragile material. Fragile and exposed to extreme environments is a bad combination. <br /><br />Spaceplanes are actually OLD concepts from the very earliest days of the space age--from an era when engineers hadn't yet come up with the idea of the "blunt body" reentry shape and parachutes and braking rockets were unreliable. To von Braun and his contemporaries wings and all the penalties they implied seemed to be a necessary evil if you wanted to bring humans back safely from space.

 

[spacefire]

Lifting bodies are a succesful concept blending blunt body re-entry capsule-style with horizontal landing. <br /><br /><br />if the hardware usage cheaper - and a lifting body spacecrfat that lands gently can be easily refurbished, launch costs will decrease even though the payload fraction is smaller. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p>http://asteroid-invasion.blogspot.com</p><p>http://www.solvengineer.com/asteroid-invasion.html </p><p> </p> </div>

 

[tomnackid]

I have yet to see a lifting body that "lands gently"! Most look, fly and land like bathtubs. Even the modern Kliper and Lockheed CEV proposals would have landed with airbags and parachutes. (I'm referring to the original lifting body version of Kliper, not the modified winged version they tried to get the ESA to invest in.) Unfortunately most lifting bodies that work well as reentry vehicles manage to combine the worst aspects of blunt bodies and aircraft. They do have an advantage when it comes to cross range and maneuverability but this is more applicable to weapons then to exploration systems. Of course the shuttle was a weapons system, a science platform and a satellite launcher--can you say "horse designed by committee?

 

[j05h]

Here comes another X-33 thread... <br /><br />Someone pointed to this wiki page recently, please skim it for an interesting comparison of reentry shapes. The two best shapes, IMHO for planetary entry speeds would be AMaRV or Discoverer-derived. The description of AMaRV (DC-Y) reentry is amazing, it's everything the Shuttle wasn't (AF requirments), zigzagging across the sky. Instead of "capsules vs. VentureStar" lets discuss something interesting like demonstrated high-speed aeroshells:<br /><br />http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_reentry<br /><br />On X-33/Venturestar, it was just a hangar-queen, "Single Stage To Montana" and it never even got to runway tests. DId they do drop tests? The ones I remember from the time were X-38/ACRV tests. X-33 had huge issues from the beginning. Venturestar was nothing more than pictures. The vehicle it comes closest to in final form, is the Kistler K1 stack - by the end of the program, the Ventrurestar "wedge" was basically just a pop-up booster for a 2nd stage. It looked good for marketing purposes but couldn't fly. It's dead now, economics and physics have finally won. <br /><br />Lockheed has to do better this time around, and I think they will. The lunar landers show acheivable designs and serious lessons-learned. Check out this post:<br /><br />http://uplink.space.com/showthreaded.php?Cat=&Board=missions&Number=582064&page=1&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=0&vc=1<br /><br />Josh <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <div align="center"><em>We need a first generation of pioneers.</em><br /></div> </div>

 

[josh_simonson]

X-33 demonstrated that single stage to orbit was still unatainable with modern technology. With it's demise Lockheed Martin then developed a plan for a two stage spaceplane system, much like STS with a winged ET, but the demise of Columbia, as a direct result of using wings, doomed such plans.<br /><br />Safety aside, for such a vehicle to be economically viable it must make about 60 flights per year. However there is no reason to think that NASA will be making more than the shuttle's 6 or so for the next decade at least. That makes a re-useable spaceplane a losing proposition, economically. As it is STS orbits the entire orbiter for $2600/lb, which is the cheapest launch in the USA, unfortunately 80% of it is re-useable spaceplane instead of cargo, so actual cargo comes in at $13000/lb - by far the worst price/orbit in the industry.

 

[tomnackid]

The discoverer shape works well for unmanned vehicles (Just look at Galileo--it slammed into Jupiter's atmosphere faster than any spacecraft in history and survive!) but because it doesn't generate any lift it subjects the crew to extremely hi G forces. A Discoverer derived shape (like t-Space's proposed CEV) performing a direct reentry from lunar distances would subject its crew to over 20 G's. Gemini, Soyuz, Apollo, and now Orion try to balance lift and heat rejection ability to reduce G forces.

 

[j05h]

> A Discoverer derived shape (like t-Space's proposed CEV) performing a direct reentry from lunar distances would subject its crew to over 20 G's.<br /><br />Ouch. That's a serious drawback.<br /><br />What about using an AMaRV/DC-Y configuration for aerobraking? I'm thinking Mars of course, using the most maneuverable biconic ever designed. Pack the whole flight into the aeroshell, use it for some deep aerobraking to reduce time to final orbit/descent.<br /><br />Josh <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <div align="center"><em>We need a first generation of pioneers.</em><br /></div> </div>

 

[willpittenger]

You just described the transportation system in <i>2001: A Space Odysess</i>. The problem for now is the huge amount of Delta V. In order to enter orbit, you have to slow down tremendously. That's a problem for now, but we might solve in the future. The only real solution with today's technology would be a risky aerobraking manuever. The concept is the same used by orbiters to enter Martian orbit. It also takes a while, although it would be faster here with Earth's thicker atmosphere -- and riskier. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <hr style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em" />Will Pittenger<hr style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em" />Add this user box to your Wikipedia User Page to show your support for the SDC forums: <div style="margin-left:1em">{{User:Will Pittenger/User Boxes/Space.com Account}}</div> </div>

 

[qso1]

As has been already mentioned here, a winged vehicle for lunar missions is a waste. Carrying all that structural mass which is useless for lunar landings and launches. The ideal reusable configuration would be a Delta Clipper type vehicle. There are no real technical obstacles to building such a vehicle for lunar ops. The real obstacle is money.<br /><br />This obstacle is ultimately also the reason the X-33 couldn't be built. The X-33 encountered the usual development problems of any major new vehicle but cost caps were in place and the X-33 succumbed to that which killed the X-30, the shuttle II, the HL-20, and a couple other designs.<br /><br />Redstone_1:<br />will we have orbitors with a payload like the shuttle anymore?<br /><br />Me:<br />The potential is there and greater. VSE has two launcher elements. One launcher for launching the CEV, another for launching the LSAM and TLI stage. Tha latter vehicle would be able to take up other heavy payloads as well. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><strong>My borrowed quote for the time being:</strong></p><p><em>There are three kinds of people in life. Those who make it happen, those who watch it happen...and those who do not know what happened.</em></p> </div>

 

[scottb50]

I'm all for the CEV just because it keeps us in Space. The problem I have with it is trying to make it do to many things at once. I thought we learned that with Shuttle?<br /><br />The primary job of CEV should be getting from the surface to LEO and back. If you want it to do anything else with it you attach it to a Module designed for that specific purpose. As an example a CEV launches to the ISS, or other assembly point and docks to a Module, providing living space for extended operations and a lunar lander/ascent vehicle. On return to Earth the CEV separates and lands like Apollo.<br /><br />Where I have a problem is trading off the cost of hardware to reduce the propellant needs. Just like the wasted wings on Shuttle the heat shield on the CEV is not needed back and forth to the moon. I think it makes more sense to build CEV to go from Earth to LEO and back to Earth and launch propellant for the vehicles that will go from LEO to the moon, and eventually Mars and returning to LEO. <br /><br />You can orbit propellant with just about any launcher, it doesn't have to be man-rated, a Falcon 2 or 3 could put a lot of propellant into orbit. It could be a cottage industry type thing. The tradeoff between carrying enough propellant to return to LEO compared to expending very expensive hardware every time you return from the moon or Mars is the key to making Space accessable. A tank can be pretty simple and cheap.<br /><br />I think the X-33 concept would work very well as long as it is a fly-back first stage with a separate upper stage, here again trying to make something do too many things seems to be a requirement in designing Space hardware, SSTO seems to be a matra while TSTO could be easily doable and fully re-usable. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[qso1]

Scottb50:<br />I'm all for the CEV just because it keeps us in Space. The problem I have with it is trying to make it do to many things at once. I thought we learned that with Shuttle?<br /><br />Me:<br />I agree and am also for CEV. To some extent, one should and usually can use a particular design for many tasks. In CEVs case, it just so happens there are lots of tasks it can do. Its one thing to design a system to do a huge number of tasks from the outset. Another to utilize a system that particular tasks fall within its design envelope.<br /><br />An example being NASA needed a shuttle with about 20,000 pounds to LEO capability. The AF wanted 65,000 pounds. The shuttle was designed to AF specs in both payload and cross range. The HLLV element of CEV once operational, wont care what it carries into space as long as it fits within the fairing and is within the payload capability of the HLLV. This is within reason of course.<br /><br />Having said all that, I think the shuttle actually proved its capability to do many things and that IMO, the idea it was designed to do too many tasks and somehow was unable to do them is actually a misconception. The shuttle failed to do one thing...be economical to operate which was basically impossible considering the state of the art in rocketry at the time of its design. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><strong>My borrowed quote for the time being:</strong></p><p><em>There are three kinds of people in life. Those who make it happen, those who watch it happen...and those who do not know what happened.</em></p> </div>

 

[docm]

"Having said all that, I think the shuttle actually proved its capability to do many things and that IMO, the idea it was designed to do too many tasks and somehow was unable to do them is actually a misconception. The shuttle failed to do one thing...be economical to operate which was basically impossible considering the state of the art in rocketry at the time of its design."<br /><br />Actually two things;<br /><br />1. as you stated it failed Economics 101<br /><br />2. it also failed in terms of inherent safety. Side-saddle launching + a fragile heat shield + a cryo tank with fragile insulation a couple of meters away was asking for trouble. It's not like most of these weren't known weaknesses. I read critical articles reporting those problems almost as soon as the design was made public, but as usual common sense was ignored. <br /><br />NASA & the political leadership of both parties continuing the program even after the operational downsides became obvious for all to see compounded the issue. IMO we should have had a VSE type system <i><b>in space</b></i> by 1995 at the latest. <br /><br />Better yet; they should have skipped the Shuttle entirely and evolved Apollo into a VSE type program, growing the capsule as needs arose. That was a good idea before Apollo was prematurely cancelled and it has withstood the test of time.<br /><br />Political problems like keeping NASA & aerospace industry employment high by moving to a needlessly complex system were unfortunately given a higher priority than evolving a working, more economical, modular and safer system.<br /><br />Go figure <img src="/images/icons/tongue.gif" /><br /> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[qso1]

docm:<br />2. it also failed in terms of inherent safety.<br /><br />Me:<br />I see that differently. The shuttle has a 98% plus success rate, all while having been in near misses such as potential catastrophes that could have resulted from several RSLS aborts. One abort to orbit, launch delays that give people the willies, all this and two accidents that ultimately were traceable to poor decisions by management.<br /><br />I'd have to say the shuttle has been a very forgiving system considering all the potential accidents, technical failures waiting to happen including accidents that we hope won't occur as a result of the very things you mention.<br /><br />What we should have been able to do, IMO is replace the shuttle with Delta Clipper or X-33. But we as a nation do not have the political will to finance those that could ultimately bring lower cost access to space which would or should finally open the potential of space.<br /><br />Apollo had far less missions than shuttle and I'd be willing to bet there would eventually have been at least 1 fatal Apollo accident had the program evolved. After all, Apollo started with a fatal mission test on the ground.<br /><br />docm:<br />Political problems like keeping NASA & aerospace industry employment high by moving to a needlessly complex system were unfortunately given a higher priority than evolving a working, more economical, modular and safer system.<br /><br />Me:<br />Certainly politics plays a role in major programs such as Apollo or shuttle but if one could go back in time to see why the shuttle came to be to start with, one might see that the same problems were being discussed as far as how much it costs to go into space, how does America invest in a space future rather than throw it all away. Shuttle seemed like the solution at the time. Continuing with Apollo was considered too costly just as shuttle and ISS are considered too costly today.<br /><br />The difference is that people tend to look at the past when the past be <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><strong>My borrowed quote for the time being:</strong></p><p><em>There are three kinds of people in life. Those who make it happen, those who watch it happen...and those who do not know what happened.</em></p> </div>

 

[spaceball]

I keep seeing posts about the high cost of space flight, $/pound into orbit and such. I suppose Lockheed and the other contractors and vendors could always just charge less. Just a thought.

 

[willpittenger]

<blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr /><p>The ideal reusable configuration [for lunar missions] would be a Delta Clipper type vehicle.<p><hr /></p></p></blockquote><br />That was actually the design for Direct Ascent. However, it was heavy and top-heavy. It died fast. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <hr style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em" />Will Pittenger<hr style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em" />Add this user box to your Wikipedia User Page to show your support for the SDC forums: <div style="margin-left:1em">{{User:Will Pittenger/User Boxes/Space.com Account}}</div> </div>

 

[scottb50]

Rightfully so. It compromises payloads considerably to simply get to LEO, to carry enough propellant to land vertically, like the Delta Clipper proposed would eliminate any payload. Soyus sort of does the same thing but from what I understood Delta Clipper was like in the 50's movies. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[qso1]

What I had in mind was a Delta Clipper like vehicle. An SSTO that launches and lands like the DC-X did. The main obstacle is having a reasonable payload plus the SSTO capability. DC-X did die fast, but that was the result of the Clinton Administrations decision to select a nice CGI concept as opposed to something that had at least 8 flights under its belt.<br /><br />The DC-Y might have been able to overcome the DC-X shortcomings being that the DC-X was mostly proof of concept. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><strong>My borrowed quote for the time being:</strong></p><p><em>There are three kinds of people in life. Those who make it happen, those who watch it happen...and those who do not know what happened.</em></p> </div>

 

[qso1]

The Delta Clipper was similar to something one might expect from a 1950s movie. You mentioned Soyuz sort of doing the same thing. If you mean the same thing that Delta Clipper did, Soyuz is not an SSTO. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><strong>My borrowed quote for the time being:</strong></p><p><em>There are three kinds of people in life. Those who make it happen, those who watch it happen...and those who do not know what happened.</em></p> </div>

 

[scottb50]

What I meant was dropping the heat shield and using rockets to slow the descent. Ther is no way something like Delta Clipper could ever have been a SSTO and returned to a vertical landing.<br /><br />Soyuz uses rockets to reduce the impact of landing, not hover and pick a spot <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[qso1]

Scottb50:<br />What I meant was dropping the heat shield and using rockets to slow the descent.<br /><br />Me:<br />Gotcha, that clears it up a bit better.<br /><br />Delta Clipper did perform vertical landings on its test flights but these were not orbital so your right concerning the DC-X itself. The DC-X which was later called Delta Clipper, then Clipper Graham, was a subscale version (43 ft tall) of the planned 127 foot tall DC-Y. Delta Clipper demonstrated its ability to launch like a rocket, and well...land like a rocket. IIRC, there were 12 test flights including the one that destroyed the DC-X due to a landing gear malfunction.<br /><br />The DC-Y was to have been an orbital version, a scaled up DC-X. But DC-Y never got built, much less tested. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><strong>My borrowed quote for the time being:</strong></p><p><em>There are three kinds of people in life. Those who make it happen, those who watch it happen...and those who do not know what happened.</em></p> </div>

 

[docm]

<blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr /><p>Me:<br />I see that differently. The shuttle has a 98% plus success rate, all while having been in near misses such as potential catastrophes that could have resulted from several RSLS aborts. One abort to orbit, launch delays that give people the willies, all this and two accidents that ultimately were traceable to poor decisions by management. <p><hr /></p></p></blockquote><br /><br />In setting up the program NASA projected a failure rate for Orion capsules of 1 in 2,000 flights. This is consistant with NASA's experiences with blunt re-entry in many, many missions.<br /><br />The projected faiure rate for the Shuttle was initially projected at 1 in 220 flights. As we now know all too well in <i>real world operations</i> the Shuttles failure rate has been 1 in 58 flights....almost 4 times the projected rate.<br /><br />Even if Orion, like the Shuttle, were to fail at 4 times its own projected rate it would still be almost 10 times safer than the Shuttle (1 failure in 500 vs 1 in 58). <br /><br />If Orion even comes <i>close</i> to matching the projections it will be one damned safe spacecraft.<br /><br /> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>