Time to Think ‘Horizontal’ for Future Space Launches

On Sep 24, 9:56*am, Jeff Findley wrote:
In article 44ed2bdf-6260-4c81-90a0-
, says...





On Sep 23, 8:46*am, Jeff Findley wrote:
In article d82da96a-39ad-47b2-915d-c97befe360f8
@x18g2000pro.googlegroups.com, says...

I agree, Jeff Pat and Fred are damn annoying and rude. *My comment was
relevant to the horizontal take off and landing statement. *I don't
see how that can be annoying and rude.

It wasn't relevant. *Your napkin drawing takes off vertically and
ultimately lands vertically. *It is not a horizontal take off and
horizontal landing vehicle, so your post was a clear thread-jack.

Nonsense. *The Air Force released a study pointing out that horizontal
landing and take off adds significantly to structure fractions for a
multi-stage orbiter.

This is true.

I provide a counter example that shows VTOVL
launch elements parallel staged makes more sense.

This is false. *Your counter example is still a napkin drawing and
proves nothing. *

Jeff
--
The only decision you'll have to make is
Who goes in after the snake in the morning?

Your opinion in this regard is worthless Jeff. Calling dimensioned
prints napkin drawings is demeaning and has no basis in fact.

On Sep 24, 12:22*pm, Fred J. McCall wrote:
Jeff Findley wrote:

It's amazing to me the things you think will be "easy" when there simply
isn't enough prior art to make it so.

But he's a SUPERgenius, Jeff. *Just ask him. *He'll tell you.

--
"Ordinarily he is insane. But he has lucid moments when he is
*only stupid."
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * -- Heinrich Heine

That ****es you off doesn't it Freddie? lol. You really ought to
learn to be nicer to people. For your own safety dude. People who
are as persistently rude and hateful as you routinely get into serious
trouble. You should just stop being so spiteful Freddie. Just stop
it.

On Sep 24, 12:20*pm, Fred J. McCall wrote:
Jeff Findley wrote:
In article
otatelephone,
says...

If you are going to land it vertically, all you need to do is stick some
parachutes in the nose and have the weight of the rear plug-nozzle
engine make it fall tail-first towards the landing site.
There's no need for the goofy wings then.

True. *You could even eliminate the parachutes and land on engine power
ala DC-X. *

In that case what you end up with is very similar to the SASSTO Saturn
IVB stage, with the plug nozzle serving as the heatshield:
http://www.up-ship.com/drawndoc/sdoc53ani.jpg

True, but then you wouldn't need the inflatable heat shield for the nose
of the ET, so that's not nearly complicated enough for Mook.

I'll merely note that Mookie's calling forth of DC-X as proof of how
easy vertical landing is sort of ignores the small fact that they
cracked the aeroshell on the vehicle on its 8th and final flight.

I never ignored it Freddie. And I didn't site the DC-X as proof of
how easy it was. I sited the DC-X to show that rocket landing on
Earth has been done. Thus, saying its unproved is wrong.

The failure was due to one of the legs not deploying. Some at the
time thought sabotage, since McDonnel Douglas was seeking private
capital at the time after the government pulled funding. This sort of
accusation has happened before - Northrup's flying wing ran into
difficulty and some thought sabotage - when he was trying to the
flying wing to airlines;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northro...nd_development
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ub6U9CL0K_A



He's got a proposed vehicle with a much bigger cross section and lower
density (a virtually empty ET) WITH WINGS that he thinks he can just
set down. *Perhaps his plan is to have it dance a hula after it goes
vertical in order to restow the wings?

Clearly in zero wind speed this isn't an issue.
Plainly with the ability to produce thrust from 0 up to 2.2 million
pounds differentially around an annulus - allows landing in cross
wind. Do you know how much? I do! You don't because you haven't
done the work Freddie. You just run your mouth. Freddie, you don't
know what analysis or testing I've done. Yet, you speak as if you
do. You also don't provide any statement of fact to support your
baseless innuendo.

So, you'd best just keep quiet, if you value what people think of you
who read your stuff.


Yeah, an engineer he ain't...

An engineer actually does engineering Freddie. Something you have yet
to demonstrate in anything you've said.

--
"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable
*man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore,
*all progress depends on the unreasonable man."
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * --George Bernard Shaw

On Sep 24, 2:04*pm, Jeff Findley wrote:
In article ,
says...





Jeff Findley wrote:

In article
otatelephone,
says...

If you are going to land it vertically, all you need to do is stick some
parachutes in the nose and have the weight of the rear plug-nozzle
engine make it fall tail-first towards the landing site.
There's no need for the goofy wings then.

True. *You could even eliminate the parachutes and land on engine power
ala DC-X. *

In that case what you end up with is very similar to the SASSTO Saturn
IVB stage, with the plug nozzle serving as the heatshield:
http://www.up-ship.com/drawndoc/sdoc53ani.jpg

True, but then you wouldn't need the inflatable heat shield for the nose
of the ET, so that's not nearly complicated enough for Mook.

I'll merely note that Mookie's calling forth of DC-X as proof of how
easy vertical landing is sort of ignores the small fact that they
cracked the aeroshell on the vehicle on its 8th and final flight.

That was a (somewhat) forgivable mistake. *

Agreed.

This was an X-vehicle, so the
design was obviously not meant to be quite as optimal as an operational
vehicle. *

It certainly wasn't flight weight.

From memory, the landing gear couldn't retract without
disconnecting and reconnecting the hoses used for lowering the landing
gear. *Before the final flight, someone forgot to reconnect a hose, so
one of the gear failed to deploy.

Yes. Some thought sabotage at the time, since Douglas was trying to
promote it as a commercial vehicle. Very similar to the history of
the flying wing.

*That sort of gear design shouldn't be
accepted in an operational vehicle where loss of one gear means loss of
vehicle.

Correct.

I believe Henry Spencer said something to the effect that X-vehicle
programs should plan on losing one or two vehicles during their flight
program and should therefore build multiple copies from the beginning. *
I tend to agree with him.

Yes.

He's got a proposed vehicle with a much bigger cross section and lower
density (a virtually empty ET) WITH WINGS that he thinks he can just
set down. *Perhaps his plan is to have it dance a hula after it goes
vertical in order to restow the wings?

This I agree with. *

I agree that areal density is rather low. This limits the cross-wind
speed one can do this sort of landing. Given the capability of the
engine to vector its thrust stability is maintained over a
surprisingly large range of speeds. Bottom line, I can land one of
these under conditions you couldn't land a parachute reliably.

He's comparing apples and oranges since the DC-X is
so different than what he's proposing.

Nonsense. If you actually looked at the numbers, you would see that
the empty weight of the DC-X divided by its surface area is very low
as well.

*Those wings are just silly in
the way they're designed and in the way they're planned to be used.

No they're not.
*

Yeah, an engineer he ain't...

True. *

Jeffie, you and Freddie should realize that real engineers can do real
engineering analysis, not play word games spiced with pointless drivel
and personal attack. If you wish to paint yourselves as real
engineers you should at least be able to do a few computations and
numerical comparisons. You haven't. I suspect because you can't!
lol.

I'm thinking he's more of a sales guy. *

I'm thinking you're more of an asshole with a degree who couldn't
design a paper bag.

In this case, he's
selling vapor-ware

No I'm not.

by trying to make it look like a real product.

And you're trying to demean a real engineer who has something
spectacular playing word games without one iota of real engineering
analysis.


Jeff
--
The only decision you'll have to make is
Who goes in after the snake in the morning?

Jeffie, you and Freddie can stroke each other all you want. It won't
make up for the absolute lack of real analysis to support any of your
bogus objections.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0l-DeTO41r8

This is an interesting retrospective on the flying wing

On Sep 24, 7:20*pm, William Mook wrote:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0l-DeTO41r8

This is an interesting retrospective on the flying wing

Pardonnez-moi, je suppose à la fois et Freddie Jeffie pourrait
facilement comprendre le français.

On Sep 24, 3:40*pm, William Mook wrote:
On Sep 24, 12:22*pm, Fred J. McCall wrote:

Jeff Findley wrote:

It's amazing to me the things you think will be "easy" when there simply
isn't enough prior art to make it so.

But he's a SUPERgenius, Jeff. *Just ask him. *He'll tell you.

--
"Ordinarily he is insane. But he has lucid moments when he is
*only stupid."
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * -- Heinrich Heine

That ****es you off doesn't it Freddie? *lol. *You really ought to
learn to be nicer to people. *For your own safety dude. *People who
are as persistently rude and hateful as you routinely get into serious
trouble. *You should just stop being so spiteful Freddie. *Just stop
it.

That's like asking the Pope to become Jewish. Trust me, it isn't
going to happen.

Have you ever gotten one good idea, better lead or interpretation from
Freddie? (I didn't think so)

Is there any technical services or good intentions of his actions ever
being positive/constructive?

Freddie talks as though he's a serious big-time insider with all the
right connections, but has anyone ever benefited from such?

~ BG

On 9/24/2010 6:47 AM, Jeff Findley wrote:


True, but then you wouldn't need the inflatable heat shield for the nose
of the ET, so that's not nearly complicated enough for Mook.

There is no need to put a heatshield on the nose; the plug nozzle engine
on the tail is heavy enough to make it fall into the atmosphere pretty
much tail-first anyway, and is already made out of heat resistant
materials to take the heat of the rocket exhaust.
Back when Philip Bono was coming up with the SSTO plug-nozzle engine
designs for Martin Aerospace like the Pegasus and Ithacus, reentry was
to be handled by ejecting some leftover LH2 from the center of the
bottom of the central plug and letting the cold gas form a sheath over
the bottom of the plug to prevent heating damage during reentry.
That's what's going on in this painting of a Pegasus reentering:
http://www.astronautix.com/graphics/p/pegasus2.jpg

Pat

In articlefcbfe968-0bb0-46ce-a6bf-f5611a8d94d4
@l32g2000prn.googlegroups.com, says...

Yet, none were lost this way.

No, that's how the SNECMA Coleoptere was lost; they tried to to do a
vertical takeoff and landing in it, and it started tumbling over
sideways as it descended. The pilot ejected, and the out of control
aircraft ended up going almost horizontal before slamming into the
ground and exploding.
And that was the last you heard of the Coleoptere; the French canceled
it and never talked about it again. :-D

Pat

On 9/24/2010 6:55 AM, Jeff Findley wrote:

The fact that this tail sitting technology has not been used in an
unmanned winged vehicle means you have no valid point.

Oh, it's pretty easy to do nowadays in a fairly small RPV; the problem
here is scale.
A largely empty ET is a huge, lightweight structure, and like I
mentioned before, any sort of a side wind, especially a gusty one, would
be a recipe for disaster.
One thing here is that the plug-nozzle engine on the bottom of the ET is
the only thing worth recovering from a economic viewpoint. The ET itself
is basically a big aluminum-lithium beer can, and by the time you stuck
effective recovery gear and a TPS on it, you will have raised its weight
so much that you will have severely compromised its ability to carry a
worthwhile payload into orbit. NASA realized this when they built the
Shuttle, which is why I've never seen a NASA proposal for a recoverable
ET since the Shuttle entered service near three decades ago.
Russia played around with a recoverable core stage for the Energia
launch vehicle with wings on it (very similar to this idea), but ditched
that idea also.
And it was going to glide-land horizontally, not try to descend
tail-first. If you stick wings on it, the only reason is to have it
glide-land; if it's going to land vertically, then there is no need to
stick wings on it.
So, why aren't we all flying those big SSTO plug-nozzle reusable
boosters like Philip Bono designed back in the 1960's?
Because there's a repetitive pattern one can notice in the "wonder
rockets" that are going to revolutionize space travel:

1.) Specific impulse of the new rocket engine to be used is overestimated.
2.) Fuel consumption of that engine to produce the desired thrust is
underestimated.

....and the big one:

3.) Total structural weight of the vehicle is _way_ underestimated,
particularly when its TPS weight enters the equation.

That's why you end up with things like Black Horse that somehow has a
mass ratio identical to a Atlas ICBM, despite having wings, a cockpit,
landing gear, non-integral non-pressure rigidized propellant tanks, and
a TPS on it.
That is one of the silliest things I've ever seen in my life, and why
people ever took it seriously for even a moment is completely beyond me,
particularly given its kerosene-hydrogen peroxide choice of propellants,
which hearkens back to the 1950s.

Pat