Europe to Join Russia in Building Next Space Shuttle

On Sun, 21 Aug 2005 05:08:02 GMT, Alan Anderson
wrote:

Cardman wrote:

Anyone interested can see a touchdown photo here...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:%...%D0%BD_rus.jpg

Wikipedia is often a useful resource, but the way you use it is starting
to get a little annoying. Spouting facts as if you know what you're
talking about is only impressive when you don't trip up on something
silly like this:

You can see that the rear end is quite cooked. Looks to me like they
are missing the carbon wing edges. Not to mention that section of the
back of the US Shuttle to protect the engines.

Buran doesn't have engines at the back that need protecting.

As was obvious from the line that says "US Space Shuttle", then I was
talking about exactly that.

It is clear to see from the mentioned photo that the back the Buran
Shuttle was badly damaged. It is therefore obvious enough that this
was due to lack of suitable thermal protection. That is why I said
that something like the US Shuttle uses could have well helped to
protect this engine-less rear end.

Since my paragraph also contained "looks to me", then this is nothing
more than a quick observation. I suspect that their version 2 model
soon had that problem solved.

In other words it is best to ask people to clarify their ambiguous
comments before making false claims. I well know that the Buran has no
main engines. Some nice extra cargo space comes out of that.

Cardman.

"Cardman" wrote in message
...

It is clear to see from the mentioned photo that the back the Buran
Shuttle was badly damaged. It is therefore obvious enough that this
was due to lack of suitable thermal protection. That is why I said
that something like the US Shuttle uses could have well helped to
protect this engine-less rear end.

No, it's not clear at all actually.

And most reports of the damage show it to be in the wing. (I've heard
various rumors as to the damage, but none involved the bottail section you
are claiming.


Since my paragraph also contained "looks to me", then this is nothing
more than a quick observation. I suspect that their version 2 model
soon had that problem solved.

In other words it is best to ask people to clarify their ambiguous
comments before making false claims. I well know that the Buran has no
main engines. Some nice extra cargo space comes out of that.

Space no. It changes the center of mass, but as far as I know, the actual
payload bay dimensions were similar.

(I'd also say at a quick glance that the wikipedia page is a bit biased in
favor of Buran.)



Cardman.

On Sun, 21 Aug 2005 05:52:58 GMT, "Greg D. Moore \(Strider\)"
wrote:


"Cardman" wrote in message
.. .

It is clear to see from the mentioned photo that the back the Buran
Shuttle was badly damaged. It is therefore obvious enough that this
was due to lack of suitable thermal protection. That is why I said
that something like the US Shuttle uses could have well helped to
protect this engine-less rear end.

No, it's not clear at all actually.

Well take a close look at that photo. It certainly looks like that
rear end took the worst of the damage. Still, it would need a better
photo to confirm that, when maybe it was just superficial markings.

And most reports of the damage show it to be in the wing. (I've heard
various rumors as to the damage, but none involved the bottail section you
are claiming.

Well as I said it was an observation. Since I am not Russian, and I
was rather young at the time, then so do I not know the specifics of
the damage report.

I did notice before that the Buran looked a little cooked, but only
recently did I become aware that it was damaged. I guess that news has
not got around nearly as much. Seeing that this was a USSR project,
then that is not much of a surprise.

That reminds me. How is that first man in space claim going these
days? When I heard that one died, and one ended up injured in China,
before Yuri Gagarin was given that title.

Space no. It changes the center of mass, but as far as I know, the actual
payload bay dimensions were similar.

Then they must have done the other option of making this Buran Shuttle
smaller. So what did they put in that engine space?

(I'd also say at a quick glance that the wikipedia page is a bit biased in
favor of Buran.)

Seems that way to me. Since the first version was more of a failed
test version, then the more important question would be how the second
version compares to the US Shuttle? As had Buran v2 made it into
space, then maybe there you would have had your Shuttle rival.

Cardman.

Chris J. wrote:
Brian Thorn wrote:
wrote:
What is the point of building a human access means to LEO which will be
operational in the 2010s ... could someone explain to me what is the
mission... what is the need ?

International Space Station. The US isn't backing out until 2015
(pretty much the 15 years agreed to in the first place) and there is
little reason to believe ISS will fall into the sea as soon as the US
pulls out.

I'm clearly missing something here; Why is the US pulling out after
ISS completion? Isn't that analogous to spending decades and billions
to build a laboratory, and then withdrawing right as it actually can
begin full research operations?

In other words, why bother to build it in the first place under this
scenario? And more to the point, why bother continuing construction?
What am I missing here?

It is no longer seen as a necessary step on the way back to the
Moon or Mars, and is seen to be somewhat of a boondoggle.

However, it is also seen by Congress (who hold the power to
redirect NASA project funding, or terminate it) as a test
of whether NASA has figured out how to do large projects
in a successful manner. It is at least somewhat widely
held in the space policy afficinados community,
that NASA would get mostly shut down if it tried
to do Moon/Mars without succeeding at Station first.


-george william herbert

Cardman wrote:
Well take a close look at that photo. It certainly looks like that
rear end took the worst of the damage. Still, it would need a better
photo to confirm that, when maybe it was just superficial markings.

The ultimate resource on Buran is of course www.buran.ru Unfortunately
most of it is in russian and it is a hell to navigate but you can still
see the pictures and translate interesting bits with babelfish. These
pages deal specifically with Buran TPS. In short: 7 tiles lost, tens of
tiles damaged, local damage to the airframe of the left wing where 3
tiles were lost.

http://www.buran.ru/htm/tersaf.htm
http://www.buran.ru/htm/tersaf4.htm
http://www.buran.ru/htm/raskroy.htm
http://www.buran.ru/htm/tersaf5.htm
http://www.buran.ru/htm/tersaf2.htm - Pictures at the bottom of the
page shows hail damage during flight to Le Bourge on the back of Mryia
http://www.buran.ru/htm/tersaf3.htm - Close-ups of TPS damage (damaged
tiles)
http://www.buran.ru/htm/terlost.htm - Close-ups of TPS damage (lost
tiles)

"Cardman" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 20 Aug 2005 18:29:23 -0700, "Reunite Gondwanaland (Mary
Shafer)" wrote:

On Sat, 20 Aug 2005 23:01:43 GMT, Cardman wrote:

Kind of a shame that this one never had more use than the one
successful auto flight. As the Buran seemed to be a better "space
shuttle" than the US Space Shuttle is.

Its only flight wasn't really all that successful. It just barely
missed being so badly damaged by aerothermodynamic heating that it
broke up in mid-air. It was so damaged that it couldn't be flown
again.

Anyone interested can see a touchdown photo here...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:%...%D0%BD_rus.jpg

You can see that the rear end is quite cooked. Looks to me like they
are missing the carbon wing edges. Not to mention that section of the
back of the US Shuttle to protect the engines.

Have you ever objectively looked at the US Shuttle after reentry? It looks
quite cooked to me on every picture!

Rene

"John Doe" wrote in message ...
Rene Altena wrote:
How do you qualify the russian Buran spacecraft (even though it is out of
service)?

Buran is history. There are no plans to fly it again. (what is the
status of the Buran that was in the hangar whose roof collapsed ?). And
because its name was/is "Buran", it wouldn't have been confused with the
NASA "Shuttle".

You know what 'Buran' means? Russia always gives symbolical, not functional
names. They would not call their 'shuttle' (that is wat it was!) 'Shuttle'.
They called it 'Snow storm'. I also heard 'Loejo' (storm) was one of the
possibilities.

Rene

wrote in message
ups.com...
For the Europeans, the answer is : not one more... the only question
being to know if ESA can afford to complete the development... there
are so many issues left unsolved, software wise, and no money left


No money left? I think ESA is wiser than NASA: investing more in scientific
spacecraft than prestigious spacecraft...

Rene

R=E9my MERCIER wrote:
Conclusion: without the "Star Trek" fiction I wonder if the World would
want to go in space...
FYI people in Soviet Union haven't seen Star Trek...

On 21 Aug 2005 04:29:27 -0700, "dmitrik" wrote:

Rémy MERCIER wrote:
Conclusion: without the "Star Trek" fiction I wonder if the World would
want to go in space...

FYI people in Soviet Union haven't seen Star Trek...

Late breaking news- the Soviet Union has broken up!!

I don't think Rémy was suggesting that the Soviets were inspired by Star
Trek. More like Americans were, causing a domino effect. Since Star
Trek didn't even air until Project Gemini was nearly over, I question the
theory. I'll advance an alternative theory. The US Space program was
inspired by Ward Bond's TV series "Wagon Train". OK, maybe not, but
I think the American need for a frontier (as in "Wagon Train") was a bigger
factor than idealistic visions of the future, ala "Star Trek". And the simple
goal of beating the USSR probably outweighed both by a lot. Had Gene
Roddenberry defected to the East, though, things might have been different.
And had he taken Ward Bond with him, well... we'd be speaking Russian here
now.

The european mission (if accepted) is to be ready for when they'll need
to go or for when they'll need to be ready to go or for when it will be
clear that one day they'll really need to be ready to go (Moon, Mars
and beyond... of course)...

If you're impatient, Rémy, you have a very humorous way of saying it

Dale