Why was the X-38 dropped?

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bdewoody

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I just read about this project in Air & Space Mag. and I remember the news footage of the successful drop tests and landings under the giant parafoil. According to the article they were only 18 months and $50 million from the first orbital flight. $50 million is chump change in the space business so I wonder why they pulled the plug when it was so close to fruition.
 
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Astro_Robert

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All of NASA's X-plane programs were cancelled in this time period, and most were close to flight. Only the flying twinkie 'X-37' survived by findin an Air Force customer. I believe most of them were cancelled to pay for Shuttle/ISS cost overruns (while claiming to support commercial enterprises such as Kistler and Roton). Additionally it is possible that when they decided not to immediately upgrade ISS beyond 3 people that they felt that a Soyuz was sufficient lifeboat and that they did not require the large CRV, although I cannot recall all the details.

Also, $50M was probably only for X-38 construction. Integration and launch on a vehicle would have most probably been extra.
 
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CalliArcale

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X-38 was dropped because of pencil-pushers, basically. Dumbest part of the ISS to dump, in my opinion, because it had the most likely follow-on value. A modified version mounted on an EELV could even have been our next manned spacecraft after Shuttle. As it is, our (as in America's) next manned spacecraft will be Soyuzes purchased from Russia. And only parts of them, really, because we'll just be buying seats. We'll have gone from moonwalkers to little better than space tourists.

*grumblegrumble*

X-37 is more interesting, because although it was axed, DARPA picked it up to fund some continued work, and then the USAF apparently stepped in, very quietly, to fully fund it. Very interesting indeed.
 
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stevekk

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Astro_Robert":2dxzf0tu said:
All of NASA's X-plane programs were cancelled in this time period, and most were close to flight. Only the flying twinkie 'X-37' survived by findin an Air Force customer. I believe most of them were cancelled to pay for Shuttle/ISS cost overruns (while claiming to support commercial enterprises such as Kistler and Roton). Additionally it is possible that when they decided not to immediately upgrade ISS beyond 3 people that they felt that a Soyuz was sufficient lifeboat and that they did not require the large CRV, although I cannot recall all the details.

Also, $50M was probably only for X-38 construction. Integration and launch on a vehicle would have most probably been extra.

I believe the X-38 was more than $50 million from flight, although I wish they gave them more time and money to work through the technical issues. I believe the biggest problem was the composite tank that they never did get right. I believe they eventually tried switching to more "standard" materials, but that also added a bunch of weight.

The lifting-body design was pretty well tested, I believe. The engines were also fairly well tested on a stand. Skunk Works just couldn't get all of the pieces integrated, and Boeing wasn't going to add more money without additional help from NASA.
 
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vulture4

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>>I believe most of them were cancelled to pay for Shuttle/ISS cost overruns (while claiming to support commercial enterprises such as Kistler and Roton).

Sean O'Keefe cncelled several of the Reusable Launch Vehicle projects to cancel out a minor cost overrun (about $4B) in the out years of the ISS program. He was an accountant, not a rocket scientist, and he was hired to put the books in order. He could have asked for a tiny budget increase, but Bush wanted tax cuts so instead he cancelled NASA's most important activity, its long-range program to develop technology that would actually reduce the cost of human spaceflight.

Although the winged X-38 design was certainly of interest aerodynamically, it had a fat fuselage and no real wings, so unlike the X-37, which was unmanned and therefore could be designed for much better aerodynamic performance, the X-38 was not capable of runway landing and so wasn't in a direct path to a practical reusable spacecraft. As a pure escape vehicle for the ISS, probably a large capsule would have been cheaper, since a parachute was needed wither way. It would have been cheaper to use a "Dragon" - type capsule (which can accomodate seven) modified for extended on-orbit storage, and it was a lot cheaper to just pay the Russians to provide a second Soyuz.
 
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neutrino78x

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CalliArcale":37o87hh0 said:
X-38 was dropped because of pencil-pushers, basically. Dumbest part of the ISS to dump, in my opinion, because it had the most likely follow-on value. A modified version mounted on an EELV could even have been our next manned spacecraft after Shuttle.

You mean, like:

The SpaceDev DreamChaser.

Already being done (see link).

We'll have gone from moonwalkers to little better than space tourists.

Well, if we are going to have the future you see in Star Wars, most of the background characters you see in that movie are not government employees. Space is something which should be accessible to the average American. Just like on The High Seas, most ships are merchant vessels, with the Navy being a small percentage, so should it be for space. Most should be merchant vessels, with NASA/USAF/USN being a small percentage. So if you want to go in that direction, and I think we should, Obama's space budget is the right one. :)

--Brian
 
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gawin

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bdewoody":3lvupl7w said:
I just read about this project in Air & Space Mag. and I remember the news footage of the successful drop tests and landings under the giant parafoil. According to the article they were only 18 months and $50 million from the first orbital flight. $50 million is chump change in the space business so I wonder why they pulled the plug when it was so close to fruition.

Sad to say but for the last 30 years the space shuttle wile a great air craft/space craft was SO over budget every year that is literally ate its siblings. It sucked every last ounce of budget it could get at the expense of every craft that could have replaced it.
 
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vulture4

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Hey, I worked on this project before it was canceled the first time. Part of the difficulty was that the X-38 was justified as an operational vehicle for a specific mission (emergency evacuation from the Space Station) for which it wasn't well suited. It was expendable and had insufficient lift for runway landing so required a parachute, which made it directly competitive with conventional capsules which were cheaper, including the Soyuz which is already in service.

Of course if it had been presented as a technology demonstrator, to learn about autonomous hypersonic entry, heat shielding, etc. it would have been a useful program, but the X-37, which can land on runways, is superior. I just don't think it's practical to reuse vehicles that have to be recovered by parachute.

The big problem is that after 2000 NASA abandoned research and development in favor of "exploration", i.e. just building rockets and flying around instead of seriously considering what it will take to make human spaceflight practical.
 
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