The return of Buran?

On Apr 15, 11:32 am, (Derek Lyons) wrote:
Andre Lieven wrote:
On Apr 14, 5:34 am, Pat Flannery wrote:
Yeah... and commie monkeys are going to come flying out of my ass while
singing the "Internationale":
http://www.russiatoday.com/Art_and_F...t_space_shuttl...

Patsky

The sheer volume of bat**** crazy that is included in that article is
breathtaking. The sidebar article also has a Soviet era class lie in it:

Oh indeed... The ones on their submarines are true classics... One
implies that the (SSBN) two crew system was *recently* created so the
(agressive/evil) Americans can make ten times as many SSBN patrols as
the patriotic and peace loving Russians who leave their SSBNs in port.

Oh dear. It appears that Soviet style SOP BS is still a fact of life
in
Russia today...

Obviously then, oil producers are warmongers because their product
fuels the arrgessive/evil Americans to do such aggressive/evil
things...

A few cycles of that, and one is a Guthian...

Andre

On Apr 15, 10:51*am, Andre Lieven wrote:
On Apr 15, 11:00*am, Quadibloc wrote:

It is generally agreed that the design of the Space Shuttle by the
U.S. was very much constrained by intended military applications, so I
don't see that a statement - even if perhaps awkwardly phrased - to
the effect that the Buran program had military motivations is wild
and crazy.

I am speaking of the specific quote: "just like the shuttle was ABLE
TO ATTACK THE USSR."

Ah. But if you're Russian, and touchy enough, it could be that you
might consider putting a spy satellite into orbit is an attack on the
U.S.S.R..

It could indeed be that I failed to read carefully.

John Savard

Andre Lieven wrote:

And, the part of using Buran to grab Skylab would require a TARDIS
with a BIG honkin' door...


This may be a screwed-up version of something the Soviets did fear at
the time...that we were going to use a Shuttle to grab a Salyut and
bring it back to Earth.
What baffled the Soviets was that when they did the math on what the
per-launch costs were on the Shuttle, their results showed it was going
to cost a lot more than a expendable vehicle, and that NASA's statements
to the contrary were a pile of BS.
So if it wasn't going to be cheaper, it must have some hidden secret use
that the US wanted despite the high cost of developing it.
Like doing a surprise bombing run on Moscow for instance. Since the
Soviets had looked into a bomber version of their orbital Spiral
spaceplane design, that would certainly occur to them.
Since the Shuttle took so long to stack and move to the pad, I assume
they were thinking a Vandenberg polar launch that was supposed to be
carrying a spy sat would actually be carrying a cargo bay full of
nuclear RVs with retro modules on them, and it would serve as the
opening round of a surprise nuclear attack on the Soviet Union. This
sounds pretty paranoid, but after the German surprise attack on them
during WW II, they probably figured it was worth being paranoid about
stuff like this.
Things certainly weren't helped by Reagan's constant sword rattling and
playful threats to blow the Soviet Union off of the map.

Pat

On Apr 14, 10:25*pm, Andre Lieven wrote:

-The Energia booster flew only twice – in May of 1987 when it
delivered
a satellite into orbit – and a year later when it circled the earth
with the
Buran spacecraft.-

Polyus FAILED to go into orbit. Duh.

Andre

The failure of Polyus was not from any fault of the launch vehicle.
For some obscure logistics reasons, Polyus was mounted on Energia
BACKWARDS, and was supposed to do a 180 manuever and fire its engine
to gain additional speed for orbital insertion. Instead, the damn
thing did a 360 and fired its engine in the original orientation,
therefore LOSING speed, and not making orbit.

You can bet some poor engineering schmuck lost his government pension
over THAT one....

Andre Lieven wrote:
Oh dear. It appears that Soviet style SOP BS is still a fact of life
in
Russia today...


To keep up with the good stuff, nothing quite beats Pravda Fun Stories:
http://funreports.com/
Comrade! The raccoon is not your sex friend! Woman! Stay away from that
dog's penis!
But some things never change: http://newsfromrussia.com/
....and on the main page, we still suck.

Pat

wrote:
The failure of Polyus was not from any fault of the launch vehicle.
For some obscure logistics reasons, Polyus was mounted on Energia
BACKWARDS, and was supposed to do a 180 manuever and fire its engine
to gain additional speed for orbital insertion. Instead, the damn
thing did a 360 and fired its engine in the original orientation,
therefore LOSING speed, and not making orbit.

You can bet some poor engineering schmuck lost his government pension
over THAT one....


The reason it was mounted that way is that there was a FGB tug mounted
atop it to give it the final push into orbit, and that was designed to
be launched by a Proton in a particular orientation, with its engines
upward.

Pat

On Apr 14, 10:25*pm, Andre Lieven wrote:

"We also wanted to take the Skylab space station from orbit. Buran
was
supposed to put it in its cargo bay and deliver it back to Earth for
studies,”

That'd be a pretty neat trick, since Skylab burned up nine YEARS
before the first (And only) unmanned Buran flight happened.


Even if Skylab hadn't burned up, and was still in orbit, it couldn't
fit the 84 x 22 foot (excluding the surviving solar array wing, which
would have to be cut loose and jettisoned) station into it's 15 x 60
foot cargo bay anyway, never mind the 77 metric ton mass. Maybe the
person being interviewed brain-farted and somehow mixed up Skylab with
Salyut 7, of which there was a basic proposal for a Buran orbiter to
retrieve.
-Mike

wrote in message
...


Even if Skylab hadn't burned up, and was still in orbit, it couldn't
fit the 84 x 22 foot (excluding the surviving solar array wing, which
would have to be cut loose and jettisoned) station into it's 15 x 60
foot cargo bay anyway, never mind the 77 metric ton mass.

GET OUT! for real?


mk5000

" I think somebody's had tee many martoonis."-- Elliot Richards: Bedazzleed

Andre Lieven wrote:
"Russian officials were concerned about a perceived ability of the US
Space Shuttle to make a sudden dive into the atmosphere to drop
bombs on Moscow, despite the fact that such a scenario was
physically impossible.[2]"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buran_program

The footnote for this item [2] is:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7738489.stm

"Years after a sceptical Pentagon had given up on the shuttle, even
as a delivery truck for spy satellites, the Russian officials
continued
whispering to journalists that the US orbiter had a secret capability
-
to make an undetected "dive" into the Earth's atmosphere and
suddenly glide over Moscow dropping nuclear bombs.

Never mind that such a scenario was not supported by physics or
by common sense."


Comrade! Buran bomber with BOR-4 type MARVs!:
http://www.buran.fr/bourane-buran/img/bor_bur.jpg

Pat

"marika" wrote in message
...

wrote in message
...


Even if Skylab hadn't burned up, and was still in orbit, it couldn't
fit the 84 x 22 foot (excluding the surviving solar array wing, which
would have to be cut loose and jettisoned) station into it's 15 x 60
foot cargo bay anyway, never mind the 77 metric ton mass.

GET OUT! for real?

For real bro. Dat Skylab was da hugest single launch space station in
his-to-rey.

Peace.

Jeff
--
"Many things that were acceptable in 1958 are no longer acceptable today.
My own standards have changed too." -- Freeman Dyson