I'd like to respond back to a few of you comments on Buran
Buran wasn't real ready to flight with a human team into space.
Buran had never reached an orbit higher than 300 km because of the missing main-engines.
The Energija was much too expensive and with four boosters maybe a greater risk as the Boosters from the STS.
Heat shield was inefficient and the used material more vulnerable to break off than the heat shield of the STS.
- Yes, Buran was rushed and trying to catch up to the Shuttle system
- Mounting the main engines on the orbiter doesn't really have anything to do with going to a higher orbit. The external tank provides propellant to the Space Shuttle Main Engines (SSMEs) and in effect looks like the core on Energia in that config (Orbiter+Core). Both Buran and Shuttle Orbiter have Orbital Maneuvering Engines which are what puts the Orbiter into its final orbit. Having the SSME's on the Orbiter is really a way to return the main engines rather than being expendable on Energia
- All else being equal, I am not convinced the Russian expendable system is more expensive than the American reusable system. The SSME's and SRM's have/had a huge standing army to support, maintain, and reuse. Plus there is a huge additional cost in the design and original manufacture to make them reusable. The characteristics of the hardware that affect design life are much more critical and costly for a system that has at 50 cycle design life like the SSME's for example vs only need to operate a few time like Energia.
I've worked with the SSME's, Shuttle Orbital Maneuvering Engines (OMEs) and with the Main Lox Hydrogen Engines on the core of Energia.
hyphon wrote:Actual BASPM is simulating ONE international space agency. Even the agency is international, the costs are astronomical. And ISS is working because there are different agencies which can split up costs.Yes and no. Yes, because indeed the monetary cost is divided amongst more players. No, because exactly this limited space spending is caused by the cooperation and its underlying political reality. There's no cold war now - no political will to engage the kind of money used in space exploration the 60s and 70s.
For example: ESA isn't paying NASA for using their scientific equipment, communication costs and resources like water and oxygen. That works because ESA is doing some things for NASA:
1. Cargo transport with the ATV.
2. Technical, engineering and scientific support with Orion via ATV technologies.
3. Allowing to use ESA probes as carrier for US/NASA instruments.
4. Let Mars Express serving as on demand backup for emergencies of MRO and MSL. (Mars Express was involved into the "Sweep&Beep" campaign to reactivate Spirit)
That sounds a cheap deal, but that pay's off. Every kilo of material that doesn't need to be paid is more worth than pure gold. So if NASA can lift 2 tons of material into space without paying the rocket, fuel, cargobay and the groundcrew, it would save several millions per launch. It's a win-win situation.
That's something that one agency can't provide. That's what I tried to say.
That was sure the main problem for the whole Russian space program. Just with help of NASA and ESA, Ruskosmos managed to keep the Mir alive for such a long time.The east never had a good shuttle program because the Buran program started too late. Before the Buran could prove its mettle, the economic situation in the eastern block fell apart, then the eastern block fell apart and finally the USSR itself fell apart. I don't see why, were it be continued, the Buran project would prove less efficient than the space shuttle.
But there were also some technical issues:
Buran wasn't real ready to flight with a human team into space.
Buran had never reached an orbit higher than 300 km because of the missing main-engines.
The Energija was much too expensive and with four boosters maybe a greater risk as the Boosters from the STS.
Heat shield was inefficient and the used material more vulnerable to break off than the heat shield of the STS.
But after all i had loved to see it starting to a real mission.
@nacho: If you realize this, please add Buran and Hermes to it. Even all the Lifting Body projects before the STS and Buran were developed.
