Black Dart update

[Urwumpe]

That would be cool !! How about Mars ?

Can you fit a greenhouse and a toilet into it? Would become a bit tiny.

Maybe we should come up with a larger "coastguard" vessel for such long range trips, where the Black Dart can dock to.

 

[Donamy]

How about a habitat in tow ?

 

[Donamy]

Dart in orbit.

 

[Arrowstar]

Three words: Ooo la la.

Looking pretty! Can't wait to take her for a spin!

 

[Urwumpe]

How about a habitat in tow ?

Well, likely it would need to be towed by the habitat to mars, then, at least from the dimensions.

 

[James.Denholm]

You know, I'm in the process of thinking about perhaps designing and making a series of Bussard-Ramjet UMMU interplanetary craft, and I realise that this would be an excellent craft for my mother-ship style craft to support, if you get my drift. Looking good, mate!

 

[DanP]

Very cool Donamy! What kind of on-board propullsion will it have?

Waiting for more!

 

[Balladeer]

Donamy that is one outstanding looking space plane! I absolutely love the military style spacecraft for Orbiter. They're my favorite. This space bird looks kin the the Blackbird. Thanks for the work.

 

[Donamy]

A couple more:

 

[James.Denholm]

Looking good! I note that the rcs is pop-out, nifty idea. At the moment, do you see the rcs coming out instantly (ie, press the button, rcs is on-line instantly), or actually taking time? Will there be something to discorage re-entries and atmospheric flight with the rcs out?

By the way, nice tail fin logo.

 

[DanP]

That looks truely fantastic!

Not traditionally beautiful but military-x-plane style beautiful, which is much better! Nice SR-71 quotes.

Is that a retractable RCS? nice idea! I'm wondering whether the doors need to be opened wider as they seem quite close to the exhaust ?

Have you any ideas yet for payloads? How big is that payload bay? I bet you could fit a hab module for 2-3 extra people or a docking/EVA module in there. The only downside is that if you put a robotic arm in there I doubt there will be room left to actually put anything in the payload bay that you captured with the arm.

So again, brilliant work!

 

[Donamy]

Thanks very much, for the input ! The forward RCS ,retract very early, before re-entry, the aft RCS, retract when the air is dense enough, to provide stability and not be a problem, in the airstream. The RCS doors, are not in the RCS plume direction. The RCS also provide stability, for the Hover engine/s, in less dense or no-atmosphere planets and moons. There is a crew area, behind the pilot, it can seat six(including pilot) however there isn't any room, for anything else. I have an RMS scaled to size, that doesn't take up much room, but it is somethig that has to be attached. It is not part of the mesh. I suppose it could have anything that can fit, put into the bay. It's demensions are 14 ft. x 8 ft.

 

[Urwumpe]

I think the rear RCS should be fixed, only for the reason, even with very optimistic reentry aerodynamics, RCS would be active until lower Mach numbers (less than Mach 10 in the best flyable case) - and retracting something at high dynamic pressure is not easy.

Also, I would suggest making the crew area modular (by IVA), so it can be adapted to different missions.

 

[penlu]

That is beautiful. Add scramjets, everything needs scramjets. Fuel efficient, doesn't need to have its oxidiser in tanks...

 

[Urwumpe]

That is beautiful. Add scramjets, everything needs scramjets. Fuel efficient, doesn't need to have its oxidiser in tanks...

I think scramjets are not really fitting to this design, like it is now, it looks more functional-military, than by adding air intakes and nozzles for a scramjet.

Outside the atmosphere, scramjets are, like wings and landing gear, dead weight. The question is always: Do you really need them? If you can't find a good justification, it is better to leave them away. Perfection is not reached, when there is nothing left to be added, but when there is nothing left to be taken away.

 

[Donamy]

Revised Dart:

Added OMS and of course fuel for them, also opted for conventional RCS system.

 

[James.Denholm]

Nooo! Normal, non-pop-out rcs! Why? Donamy, how could you?

I lie. It still looks mostly awesome.

 

[DanP]

Looks amazing! Conventional RCS looks even better than (the very cool) retractable one.

I like the OMS configuration. Seems it retains the large middle nozzle though. Will that be the main propulsion system functioning as a (cryogenic?) upper stage on ascent, with the OMS used in orbit, or do you have a different approach?

 

[Donamy]

Most likely, the main engine will be used for TLE and return. Still classified.

 

[xmariox]

Very interesting and nice Don!