New Spaceplane Project

[chudsosoft]

The first stage, the big lifter plane, you say it reaches Mach 11. Does it use (sc)RAM-jets? If so, what propulsion does it use to take off?
If it uses gas turbines for the first part of the flight, lower speeds/altitudes, it would need some sort of complex double propulsion system, gas turbines combined with RAM jets (with no moving parts) for the higher speeds.

<snip>

The SR-71 did this over 40 years ago. Its engines basically operated on continuous afterburner. The faster it went, more and more air bypassed the compressor and went straight into the afterburner until it was generating over 75% of its thrust from ramjet action. Studies suggest that speeds of at least mach 6 are possible using the same technology.

 

[Urwumpe]

Studies suggest that speeds of at least mach 6 are possible using the same technology.

Only if you can use active cooling for the engine parts and the incoming air, as well as rely on hydrogen as fuel.

Theoretically possible does not mean, it is useful.

 

[Notebook]

Not a gas turbine engine, but this woud get you to M11, and a bit more

http://www.reactionengines.co.uk/sabre.html

or for more sedate speeds

http://www.reactionengines.co.uk/lapcat_scim.html

N.

 

[GregBurch]

Whoa!!! if the boarding is animated in the final release... this will be the first addon where you can see people getting on and off! I sense a revolution here...

I'm sorry to disappoint you, but an effect like that would require an army of programmers far, far smarter than I am. No, this is just me fooling around with static rendering in aid of my design work. Images like this one will be included in the addon's documentation, though, in support of the most important element of the addon's functioning: The user's imagination.

GB

 

[GregBurch]

Only if you can use active cooling for the engine parts and the incoming air, as well as rely on hydrogen as fuel.

Theoretically possible does not mean, it is useful.

The two big issues for hypersonic air-breathers seam to be 1) "combined cycle" operation and 2) combustion air speed. The former is the question of needing some kind of propulsion to get to ram/scram speeds. The Northrop Grumman study I cited above appears to address this in the most straightforward fashion by not trying to use any kind of overly-clever new technology to achieve this: The NorGrum engineers just sucked it up (pun intended) and put two complete sets of engines into their concept. That's what I'm imagining for my hypersonic air-breathing addons, and I'm just doing some hand-waiving about the need to cool the turbines when they're "off duty."

As to the second issue, the kind of half-orbital velocities I'm looking at for an air-breather just can't happen without true scram jets, i.e. supersonic combustion air flow. Again, I'm very impressed by the NorGrum approach here, which pushes past the ram/scram barrier by brute force and the confidence in current research that indicates that all the fluid flow and "non-start" issues that have seemed so difficult for scram jet design and implementation really aren't.

GB

 

[chudsosoft]

Only if you can use active cooling for the engine parts and the incoming air, as well as rely on hydrogen as fuel.

Theoretically possible does not mean, it is useful.

I'm far from an expert on the topic. I was just pointing out that such a thing wouldn't really be that far-fetched.

 

[tgep]

Outstanding work !

I always look foreward to your new add ons as I keep learning more and more about SC3 module writing.

I do think it's time to take it to the next level though as your add ons really would benifit from custom .dll modules.

I wish I could get a handle on M$VS 2008....:sorry:

 

[reverend]

Nice design.

 

[Belisarius]

Great stuff Mr B, I'm looking foward to it. Don't worry about the custom.dll thing, the SC3 ships fly just fine!

 

[GregBurch]

After being 99.99% finished, I decided the design of the air-breathing first stage just wasn't consistent with the current state of the art in hypersonic aerodynamics. So I ditched it and am closing in on finishing a complete redesign:

GB

 

[Whatu]

99.99%finished! Yeah I guess we'll be using it in no time :speakcool::lol:
Nice design, that first stage looks huge but its cool.
And, is it reusable? I mean, when you separate from it what happens? can you land it?
Great work

 

[GregBurch]

99.99%finished! Yeah I guess we'll be using it in no time :speakcool::lol:
Nice design, that first stage looks huge but its cool.
And, is it reusable? I mean, when you separate from it what happens? can you land it?

Actually, it's not as big as you may think. Here's a pic with a two-meter tall person to scale (the orbiter is VERY small):

... and yes, both of the first two stages are fully functional in terms of being able to land them, with working landing gear and control surfaces. Managing three spacecraft at one time is a handful, but I've done it in testing.

GB

 

[Quinn]

The aerodynamic changes for the first stage look great. A lot of the more recent studies into high Mach performance seem to be more linear than the compound curves that appeared in all the concept art from 20-30 years ago.
You mentioned using LH/LOX as fuel. Are you looking at LH for the first stage fuel as well or do you envision something else?

 

[GregBurch]

The aerodynamic changes for the first stage look great. A lot of the more recent studies into high Mach performance seem to be more linear than the compound curves that appeared in all the concept art from 20-30 years ago.
You mentioned using LH/LOX as fuel. Are you looking at LH for the first stage fuel as well or do you envision something else?

Well, since I'm imagining near-Clarke's-Third-Law technology (but no "magic physics"), why not LH to fuel all of the stages? If my primitive understanding of the chemistry involved is right, then it does have the highest energy density, right?

 

[pete.dakota]

That IS a tiny orbiter. It's looking great, Greg. Nice work. Whatu touched on something I've been wondering about this project, too. If I understand correctly that the first 2 stages will fall back to Earth/re-enter, then what steps, if any, are being taken to make this realistically possible?

Is this thing's home going to be KSC? A base where there are downrange runways for landing the 1st stage? Or is it designed to be turned around and RTLS after seperation?

I'm guessing that the 2nd stage does a once around like the TX after orbiter seperation?

It's looking great so far.

 

[GregBurch]

That IS a tiny orbiter. It's looking great, Greg. Nice work. Whatu touched on something I've been wondering about this project, too. If I understand correctly that the first 2 stages will fall back to Earth/re-enter, then what steps, if any, are being taken to make this realistically possible?

Is this thing's home going to be KSC? A base where there are downrange runways for landing the 1st stage? Or is it designed to be turned around and RTLS after seperation?

I'm guessing that the 2nd stage does a once around like the TX after orbiter seperation?

All of my spaceplanes are developed with my "Equatorial Bases" addon as the default foundation. There are three spread around the equator. The first stage makes it most easily to the "next in line," e.g. if you take off from Amazonia, then you should land the first stage at Atlantica, and so on.

The second stage can either do a "once around" skip glide to land in the same place it took off, or can land two bases "down the line," e.g. from Amazonia to Pacifica, and so on.

Which is not to say that you can't launch from just about anywhere. You're just going to have to figure out your own energy management. The first stage can, indeed do a 180/RTLS, while you've got lots of cross-range capability to make a once-around skip glide back to even high-inclination launch sites with the second stage.

GB

 

[Quinn]

Well, since I'm imagining near-Clarke's-Third-Law technology (but no "magic physics"), why not LH to fuel all of the stages? If my primitive understanding of the chemistry involved is right, then it does have the highest energy density, right?

LH is also relatively easy to produce. Its the handling and storage that present the most problems.
You may find this interesting as reference:

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19950005173_1995105173.pdf

It reads like a typical government research document.

 

[GregBurch]

It's done:

http://orbiter-forum.com/showthread.php?p=18180#post18180

GB

 

[Andy44]

Greg, while browsing the "Lenticular Vehicles" section of astronautix.com, I ran across this proposal from 1963 that looks kind of similar to your project here. It's a lenticular 12-man spaceplane with a two-stage resusable winged launcher, apparently sled-launched. First stage was kerolox, second was hydrolox. Very neat stuff.

http://astronautix.com/craft/naattocv.htm

 

[ar81]

My goal was to design the minimum aerodynamic envelope that could hold five people and associated propulsion, life support and other gear, along with a folding docking mechanism.

Where is the greenhouse and waste treatment bioreactor? :lol:

If your vessel is equipped with lithium peroxide CO2 absorber canisters, range of flight would be reduced. You might need about one per day, it is required about 1 kg of absorber per each daily kg of CO2 that is being produced. Your craft becomes a minisubmarine.

Now that you mentioned ergonomics, an interesting situation came to my mind. I recall multiple times in the past when I have found that most of people think about ergonomics as "comfort".

Ergonomics is related to human engineering, an applied science that coordinates the design of devices, systems, and physical working conditions with the capacities and requirements of the worker.

Ignoring ergonomics is not ignoring comfort, it is ignoring capacities and requirements of the worker. A single visit to the dictionary would solve the misunderstanding of those many people. It is my believe that many people around the world have inhuman conditions at work because their bosses have not visited a dictionary.