Buran Website Finds So Far

Pat Flannery wrote:
Buran reentry damage:
http://www.buran.ru/htm/terlost.htm
http://www.buran.ru/htm/tersaf2.htm
http://www.buran.ru/htm/tersaf3.htm

I see pics of superficial re-entry damage, but AIUI the airframe was so
badly distorted by the only (automatically piloted) orbital re-entry
that further space-flight of the vehicle was not possible.

Is this mentioned in the text at all?

- Peter

I had to make a small research on the Buran a while ago and saw it's
first and only flight into space. An unmanned mission using the
Buran's own computers from launch to landing, and I must admit it was
quite impressive. Russian technology, at least from my part, was much
more superior to American technology (I know people might think
contrary) but if we look at the facts: the Buran's structure allowed it
to loose virtually no great quantity of tile sheets (contrary to the
NASA disaster with Columbia - which, might I add, they knew it was an
issue since the first day of flight), secondly, the fact that the Buran
could manuver relying only on computer and memory to launch, orbit the
earth and then come back and land by itself adjusting with all the
climate and temperature changes, I think NASA has yet to learn and
lower their pride a bit. As with other American projects nowadays, the
US seems too proud of itself to allow external recommendations. For
crying out loud, these designs and layouts are public on the internet -
why hasn't NASA taken any steps to implement this technology and simply
re-design the space shuttle after the Buran? Or can't they work with
the Russians? Just another reason why NASA is questionable in this
area of space.

On 2005-05-17, Ricardo Alfaro wrote:
could manuver relying only on computer and memory to launch, orbit the
earth and then come back and land by itself adjusting with all the
climate and temperature changes, I think NASA has yet to learn and

It is worth noting that Buran's remarkable ability in this field is not
quite so good as as been touted; the computer program to land the
orbiter was sufficiently quirky that took a wrong turning and almost ran
down a chase plane en route...

http://groups-beta.google.com/group/...8dea3c48e9ea2f

A lot of the seeming benefit of Buran fundamentally boils down to the
fact that it only flew once, and that in a very restricted way; it
simply didn't have a chance to demonstrate many of the more interesting
problems which would doubtless have turned up eventually.

--
-Andrew Gray

"Ricardo Alfaro" wrote
I had to make a small research on the Buran a while ago and saw it's
first and only flight into space. An unmanned mission using the
Buran's own computers from launch to landing, and I must admit it was
quite impressive.

I think that is the consensus here on this group.

Russian technology, at least from my part, was much
more superior to American technology (I know people might think
contrary) ...

It's easy to be impressed by one side's technology when you don't klnow
much about the other side's, in this case, NASA's, as your subsequent
assertions demonstrate:

but if we look at the facts: the Buran's structure allowed it
to loose virtually no great quantity of tile sheets (contrary to the
NASA disaster with Columbia - which, might I add, they knew it was an
issue since the first day of flight),

Nobody knows the likely flight history of Buran after 20 to 30 missions,
since it only made one mission, so this comparison is unfair.

secondly, the fact that the Buran
could manuver relying only on computer and memory to launch, orbit the
earth and then come back and land by itself adjusting with all the
climate and temperature changes, I think NASA has yet to learn and
lower their pride a bit.

NASA has all the software loaded for a fully automated mission (some
critical switches remained for finger-pushing but would have been easily
automated as well), and tested it on simulator aircraft flights, so the
Buran
system has no advantage there. This so-called 'advantage' may only be
a propaganda spin on a necessity -- fly Buran as fast as possible even
though the life support systems for the crew wasn't ready (the cosmonauts
believed that the first flight would be manned, if the hardware was
completed
in time). The Buran electrical power system was also not ready -- so instead
of
fuel cells (which NASA has been flying since 1965, and since the first
shuttle
orbital flight in 1981), the vehicle was loaded with heavy chemical
batteries.
This was not a 'superior' technical achievement.

As with other American projects nowadays, the
US seems too proud of itself to allow external recommendations.

The Russians have always accused us of stealing their space secrets
to copy them. Which is it?

For crying out loud, these designs and layouts are public on the
internet -
why hasn't NASA taken any steps to implement this technology and simply
re-design the space shuttle after the Buran? Or can't they work with
the Russians? Just another reason why NASA is questionable in this
area of space.

This board is full of criticisms of NASA decisions and NASA systems,
but none of your comments would survive a day's discussion because they seem
based on your own 'chip on your shoulder' and fuelled by significant
ignorance
of real NASA space activities.

Revision wrote:

Yes. This goes way back. IIRC the Soviets came up with their planned
Buran response to US "attack shuttle" back around 1971 or in the early
70s anyway.

The notion of a Buran filled with nukes, death rays, and poison gas is
another example of Russia's idea of how to make the world a better
place.




Here's the Soviet KS station design that would have used four wingless
Buran shuttles as space cruisers that could sortie from it to perform
nuclear bombing from orbit: http://www.astronautix.com/craft/ks.htm
which almost look like oversized Kliper spacecraft.
Then from the Buran website, here are photos of the Polyus battle
station mock-up (unless this is the real one, and they repainted it)
with the cover over the station's Cosmos tug removed, and the big red
star of the Soviet military visible on one of its side modules:
http://www.buran.ru/htm/cargo.htm
The multi-faceted widget visible on the side:
http://www.buran.ru/images/jpg/pole24.jpg
http://www.buran.ru/images/jpg/pole25.jpg
Appears to be the nuclear space mine launcher, based on the cutaway from
Mark Wade's site:
http://www.astronautix.com/craft/polyus.htm
Unless it is the anti-recoil system for the same.

Pat

"Ricardo Alfaro" wrote in message
oups.com...
I had to make a small research on the Buran a while ago and saw it's
first and only flight into space. An unmanned mission using the
Buran's own computers from launch to landing, and I must admit it was
quite impressive. Russian technology, at least from my part, was much
more superior to American technology (I know people might think
contrary) but if we look at the facts: the Buran's structure allowed it
to loose virtually no great quantity of tile sheets (contrary to the
NASA disaster with Columbia - which, might I add, they knew it was an
issue since the first day of flight),

Which "great quantity of tile sheets" are you referringto?

secondly, the fact that the Buran
could manuver relying only on computer and memory to launch, orbit the
earth and then come back and land by itself adjusting with all the
climate and temperature changes, I think NASA has yet to learn and
lower their pride a bit.

Computer-wise, the shuttle could have done the same thing, they choose not
to for a variety of reasons.

And in any case, as others have noted, during the landing sequence it did
turn in an unexpected way and nearly hit a chase plane.


As with other American projects nowadays, the
US seems too proud of itself to allow external recommendations. For
crying out loud, these designs and layouts are public on the internet -
why hasn't NASA taken any steps to implement this technology and simply
re-design the space shuttle after the Buran? Or can't they work with
the Russians? Just another reason why NASA is questionable in this
area of space.


Because there's little about Buran that would improve the shuttle.

Peter Smith wrote:


I see pics of superficial re-entry damage, but AIUI the airframe was
so badly distorted by the only (automatically piloted) orbital
re-entry that further space-flight of the vehicle was not possible.

Is this mentioned in the text at all?

I can't read Russian, so I wouldn't know if it gets mentioned on that
web site; I've heard this mentioned before around sci.space.history, but
don't think I've ever read about it outside of the newsgroup.
I did locate the English language Buran FAQ; and it says no.:
http://www.k26.com/buran/Info/Site_F...an_f_a_q_.html

"I read on a newsgroup that Buran was heavily damaged on reentry on its
first flight, resulting in warping of the airframe, is this true?

No. There is no evidence at all to support this. Looking through Google
I managed to trace this rumour back to one misinformed newsgroup post
about five years ago. Buran in fact survived reentry very well, losing a
remarkably small amount of tiles. It’s heat tolerance levels are
actually better than the US shuttles."

That's off of this website: http://www.k26.com/buran/

On the other hand, after the loss of Columbia, I sent the CAIB a Email
regarding the tile damage that Buran sustained during reentry and
bringing it to their attention that due to the similarity with
Columbia's design they might want to contact the Russians about it- they
replied:

"Dear Mr. Flannery:

In March you wrote to us about a rumored burn-through in the Buran and how
that might be a similar incident to what happened to Columbia:

"Has anyone contacted the Russians about the damage the Soviet
"Buran" shuttle suffered on the reentry from its only orbital test flight?
It apparently suffered a burn through in its wing structure; and
information on how the superheated plama affected its internal wing
structure could be a valuable analog to what happened to Columbia."

When this was received by the CAIB, it was forwarded to us in the Columbia
Task Force to track down. It has taken a while, but we finally found the
right guy at RSC-Energia to discuss this with, Dr. Ernst Demchinko. Our
NASA Russian Safety interface lead met with Dr. Demchinko and was assured
that this was not true. He said that there was damage to the wing, but
only in that it was very similar to the typical damage suffered by U.S.
shuttles and was easily repairable.

As an aside, and possibly some corroboration, I made several trips to
Baikonur in the late '90's when I was the NASA flight integration manager
for the Russian Service Module Zvezda and was there when it launched. On
my first trip to Baikonur, I think it was in 1996, we visited the facility
where the flown Buran was stored (there were actually four Burans...one is
now a restaurant in Moscow) and got to walk around it. There was no
indication of any significant damage. If I were at my normal office here
at JSC I would send you an electronic picture which I was allowed to take.

Well, although belatedly, I hope this answers your question. It was a
great question and got us to thinking that there might be a clue there. I
also hope that you've been following the investigation and know that the
CAIB is nearing conclusion and expects to issue its Final Report to the
President, Congress and NASA on July 23rd. We at NASA have already started
to implement their known recommendations with the hope of fixing what must
be fixed and returning to flight early next year. Thanks for the inquiry."


Later, I sent them the website address (a HAARP conspiracy site that had gotten mentioned here of all places, that had the photos- it's no longer up, but the URL was http://www.columbiassacrifice.com/buran.htm ) that had those photos of Buran after the flight with the TPS damage, and the overall look of the vehicle after the flight- they replied:


"Amazing website. I had no idea anything was out there like that. I intend
to spend some time over the next few days reading it. With all the things
going on with this investigation it's been hard to get it "integrated".

The pictures of the Buran are familiar. They don't really insinuate loss of
a vehicle, but if I were a Russian designer, it would have scared the hell
out of me to see my thermal protection system incur such damage. They
probably realized that they had a lot of work to do before risking a live
crew mission and with their economy falling apart, there was no way they
could sustain it.

Thanks for the inputs."

I'll give the name of who those two replies were from (same person) via private post to anyone who wants it (and who I would trust), but don't think I should go putting it on the newsgroups, as it was a private post.

Pat

Jim Oberg wrote:

Nobody knows the likely flight history of Buran after 20 to 30 missions,
since it only made one mission, so this comparison is unfair.



BTW, that Buran FAQ says that they were going to put the jet engines
back on the orbiter at some future date, although I don't know why.

Pat

"Ricardo Alfaro" wrote:

I had to make a small research on the Buran a while ago and saw it's
first and only flight into space. An unmanned mission using the
Buran's own computers from launch to landing, and I must admit it was
quite impressive. Russian technology, at least from my part, was much
more superior to American technology (I know people might think
contrary) but if we look at the facts: the Buran's structure allowed it
to loose virtually no great quantity of tile sheets (contrary to the
NASA disaster with Columbia - which, might I add, they knew it was an
issue since the first day of flight), secondly, the fact that the Buran
could manuver relying only on computer and memory to launch, orbit the
earth and then come back and land by itself adjusting with all the
climate and temperature changes, I think NASA has yet to learn and
lower their pride a bit. As with other American projects nowadays, the
US seems too proud of itself to allow external recommendations. For
crying out loud, these designs and layouts are public on the internet -
why hasn't NASA taken any steps to implement this technology and simply
re-design the space shuttle after the Buran? Or can't they work with
the Russians? Just another reason why NASA is questionable in this
area of space.

So where is the Buran today, and will it ever fly again?

In article ,
says...

Appears to be the nuclear space mine launcher, based on the cutaway from
Mark Wade's site:
http://www.astronautix.com/craft/polyus.htm
Unless it is the anti-recoil system for the same.

Pat


I wouldn't put much faith in that particular version of the cutaway,
there seems to been alot of umm imagination used in translating it from
the original Russian version.