Spaceplane
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A spaceplane is a vehicle that can
Four types of spaceplanes have successfully launched to orbit,
At least two suborbital rocket-powered aircraft have been launched horizontally into sub-orbital spaceflight from an airborne carrier aircraft before rocketing beyond the Kármán line: the X-15 and SpaceShipOne.[a]
Operational principles
Spaceplanes must operate in space, like traditional spacecraft, but also must be capable of atmospheric flight, like an aircraft. These requirements drive up the complexity, risk, dry mass, and cost of spaceplane designs. The following sections will draw heavily on the US Space Shuttle as the biggest, deadliest, most complex, most expensive, most flown, and only crewed orbital spaceplane, but other designs have been successfully flown.
Launch to space
The flight trajectory required to reach orbit results in significant aerodynamic loads, vibrations, and accelerations, all of which have to be withstood by the vehicle structure.[citation needed]
If the launch vehicle suffers a catastrophic malfunction, a conventional capsule spacecraft is propelled to safety by a launch escape system. The Space Shuttle was far too big and heavy for this approach to be viable, resulting in a number of abort modes that may or may not have been survivable. In any case, the Challenger disaster demonstrated that the Space Shuttle lacked survivability on ascent.
Space environment
Once on-orbit, a spaceplane must be supplied with power by solar panels and batteries or fuel cells, maneuvered in space, kept in thermal equilibrium, oriented, and communicated with. On-orbit thermal and radiological environments impose additional stresses. This is in addition to accomplishing the task the spaceplane was launched to complete, such as satellite deployment or science experiments.
The Space Shuttle used
Atmospheric reentry
Orbital spacecraft reentering the Earth's atmosphere must shed
The Space Shuttle Columbia disaster was the direct result of a TPS failure.
Aerodynamic flight and horizontal landing
Aerodynamic control surfaces must be actuated. Landing gear must be included at the cost of additional mass.
Air-breathing orbital spaceplane concept
An air-breathing orbital spaceplane would have to fly what is known as a 'depressed trajectory,' which places the vehicle in the high-altitude hypersonic flight regime of the atmosphere for an extended period of time. This environment induces high dynamic pressure, high temperature, and high heat flow loads particularly upon the leading edge surfaces of the spaceplane, requiring exterior surfaces to be constructed from advanced materials and/or use active cooling.[citation needed]
Orbital spaceplanes
Space Shuttle
The
The first (
Space Shuttle components include the
Buran
The Buran programme (Russian: Буран, IPA: [bʊˈran], "Snowstorm", "Blizzard"), also known as the "VKK Space Orbiter programme" (Russian: ВКК «Воздушно-Космический Корабль», lit. 'Air and Space Ship'),[7] was a Soviet and later Russian reusable spacecraft project that began in 1974 at the Central Aerohydrodynamic Institute in Moscow and was formally suspended in 1993.[8] In addition to being the designation for the whole Soviet/Russian reusable spacecraft project, Buran was also the name given to orbiter 1K, which completed one uncrewed spaceflight in 1988 and was the only Soviet reusable spacecraft to be launched into space. The Buran-class orbiters used the expendable Energia rocket as a launch vehicle.
The Buran programme was started by theX-37
The
Chongfu Shiyong Shiyan Hangtian Qi
Suborbital rocket planes
Two piloted suborbital rocket-powered aircraft have reached space: the North American X-15 and SpaceShipOne; a third, SpaceShipTwo, has crossed the US-defined boundary of space but has not reached the higher internationally recognised boundary. None of these crafts were capable of entering orbit, and all were first lifted to high altitude by a carrier aircraft.
On 7 December 2009,
The Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-105 was an atmospheric prototype of an intended orbital spaceplane, with the suborbital BOR-4 subscale heat shield test vehicle successfully reentering the atmosphere before program cancellation. HYFLEX was a miniaturized suborbital demonstrator launched in 1996, flying to 110 km altitude, achieving hypersonic flight, and successfully reentering the atmosphere.[24][25]
History of unflown concepts
Various types of spaceplanes have been suggested since the early twentieth century. Notable early designs include a spaceplane equipped with wings made of combustible alloys that it would burn during its ascent, and the
United States (1950s–2010s)
The
In 1961, NASA originally planned to have the
The Space Shuttle underwent many variations during its conceptual design phase. Some early concepts are illustrated.
The Rockwell X-30 National Aero-Space Plane (NASP), begun in the 1980s, was an attempt to build a scramjet vehicle capable of operating like an aircraft and achieving orbit like the shuttle. Introduced to the public in 1986, the concept was intended to reach Mach 25, enabling flights between Dulles Airport to Tokyo in two hours, while also being capable of low Earth orbit.[33] Six critical technologies were identified, three relating to the propulsion system, which would consist of a hydrogen-fueled scramjet.[33]
The NASP program became the Hypersonic Systems Technology Program (HySTP) in late 1994. HySTP was designed to transfer the accomplishments made in hypersonic flight into a technology development program. On 27 January 1995 the Air Force terminated participation in (HySTP).[33]
In 1994, a USAF captain proposed an
The Lockheed Martin X-33 was a 1/3 scale prototype made as part of an attempt by NASA to build a SSTO hydrogen-fuelled spaceplane VentureStar that failed when the hydrogen tank design could not be constructed as intended.[citation needed]
On 5 March 2006,
In 2011, Boeing proposed the X-37C, a 165 to 180 percent scale
Soviet Union (1960s–1991)
The Soviet reusable spacecraft programme has its roots in the late 1950s, at the very beginning of the space age. The idea of Soviet reusable space flight is very old, though it was neither continuous nor consistently organized. Before Buran, no project of the programme reached operational status.
The first step toward a reusable Soviet spacecraft was the 1954
The Buran orbital vehicle programme was developed in response to the U.S. Space Shuttle program, which raised considerable concerns among the Soviet military and especially Defense Minister Dmitry Ustinov. An authoritative chronicler of the Soviet and later Russian space programme, the academic Boris Chertok, recounts how the programme came into being.[38] According to Chertok, after the U.S. developed its Space Shuttle program, the Soviet military became suspicious that it could be used for military purposes, due to its enormous payload, several times that of previous U.S. launch vehicles. Officially, the Buran orbital vehicle was designed for the delivery to orbit and return to Earth of spacecraft, cosmonauts, and supplies. Both Chertok and Gleb Lozino-Lozinskiy (General Designer and General Director of NPO Molniya) suggest that from the beginning, the programme was military in nature; however, the exact military capabilities, or intended capabilities, of the Buran programme remain classified.
Like its American counterpart, the Buran orbital vehicle, when in transit from its landing sites back to the launch complex, was transported on the back of a large jet aeroplane – the Antonov An-225 Mriya transport aircraft, which was designed in part for this task and was the largest aircraft in the world to fly multiple times.[39] Before the Mriya was ready (after the Buran had flown), the Myasishchev VM-T Atlant, a variant on the Soviet Myasishchev M-4 Molot (Hammer) bomber (NATO code: Bison), fulfilled the same role.The Soviet Union first considered a preliminary design of rocket-launch small spaceplane Lapotok in early 1960s. The Spiral airspace system with small orbital spaceplane and rocket as second stage was developed in the 1960s–1980s.[citation needed] Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-105 was a crewed test vehicle to explore low-speed handling and landing.[40]
Russia
In the early 2000s the orbital 'cosmoplane' (Russian: космоплан) was proposed by Russia's Institute of Applied Mechanics as a passenger transport. According to researchers, it could take about 20 minutes to fly from Moscow to Paris, using hydrogen and oxygen-fueled engines.[41][42]
United Kingdom
The Multi-Unit Space Transport And Recovery Device (MUSTARD) was a concept explored by the British Aircraft Corporation (BAC) around 1968 for launching payloads weighing as much as 2,300 kg (5,000 lb) into orbit. It was never constructed.[43]
In the 1980s,
Bristol Spaceplanes has undertaken design and prototyping of three potential spaceplanes since its founding by David Ashford in 1991. The European Space Agency has endorsed these designs on several occasions.[48]
European Space Agency (1985–)
In the 1980s, West Germany funded design work on the
Hopper was one of several proposals for a European reusable launch vehicle (RLV) planned to cheaply ferry satellites into orbit by 2015.[52] One of those was 'Phoenix', a German project which is a one-seventh scale model of the Hopper concept vehicle.[53] The suborbital Hopper was a Future European Space Transportation Investigations Programme system study design[54] A test project, the Intermediate eXperimental Vehicle (IXV), has demonstrated lifting reentry technologies and will be extended under the PRIDE programme.[55]
Japan
India
Current development programs
China
Shenlong (Chinese: 神龙; pinyin: shén lóng; lit. 'divine dragon') is a proposed Chinese robotic spaceplane that is similar to the Boeing X-37.[59] Only a few images have been released since late 2007.[60][61][62]
European Union
A test project, the Intermediate eXperimental Vehicle (IXV), has demonstrated lifting reentry technologies and will be extended under the PRIDE programme.[55] The FAST20XX Future High-Altitude High Speed Transport 20XX aims to establish sound technological foundations for the introduction of advanced concepts in suborbital high-speed transportation with air-launch-to-orbit ALPHA vehicle.[63]
The Daimler-Chrysler Aerospace RLV is a small reusable spaceplane prototype for the ESA Future Launchers Preparatory Programme/FLTP program. SpaceLiner is the most recent project.[citation needed]
The Space Rider (Space Reusable Integrated Demonstrator for Europe Return) is a planned uncrewed orbital lifting body spaceplane aiming to provide the European Space Agency (ESA) with affordable and routine access to space.[64][65][66] Contracts for construction of the vehicle and ground infrastructure were signed in December 2020.[67] Its maiden flight is currently scheduled for the third quarter of 2025.[68]
Development of Space Rider is being led by the Italian Programme for Reusable In-orbit Demonstrator in Europe (PRIDE programme) in collaboration with ESA, and is the continuation of the Intermediate eXperimental Vehicle (IXV) experience,[69][70] launched on 11 February 2015. The cost of this phase, not including the launcher, is at least US$36.7 million.[71] At the ESA Ministerial Council held in Seville in November 2019, the development of the Space Rider was subscribed by the participating member states with an allocation of €195.73 million.[72]India
As of 2016[update], the
Japan
As of 2018, Japan is developing the Winged Reusable Sounding rocket (WIRES), which if successful, may be used as a recoverable first-stage or as a crewed sub-orbital spaceplane.[76]
US
International
The Dawn Mk-II Aurora is a suborbital spaceplane being developed by Dawn Aerospace to demonstrate multiple suborbital flights per day. Dawn is based in the Netherlands and New Zealand, and is working closely with the American CAA. On December 9, 2020, the Civil Aviation Authority of New Zealand, working alongside the New Zealand Space Agency, issued a license allowing the vehicle to fly from a conventional airport.[80] On August 25, 2021, the first test-flight campaign of five successful flights using surrogate jet engines was announced.[81] As of August 15, 2022, 35 test flights have been complete, validating the vehicles aerodynamics, avionics, rapid deployment and various piloting modes.[82] A qualified 2.5 kN.s pump-fed HTP/kerosene engine is being installed for high-performance high-altitude flights. Dawn Aerospace previously demonstrated multiple low-altitude rocket-powered flights per day on their Mk-I vehicle.[83]
See also
- Ansari X Prize
- List of crewed spacecraft
- List of space launch system designs
Notes
- ^ In 2018, SpaceShipTwo passed the US definition of space of 80km, but not the 100km Kármán line.
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