Spacebucket

[Tobius]

X-37. Concept (Dynasoar) was not abandoned. Just changed. Ares was test launched and it did not work. Too much vibration in the stack during powered ascent.

SLS looks to be another "problematic".

[eswube]

Shuttle-C is very interesting. Never heard about it before.
Does lack of wings, vertical stabilizer and thermal coating on the bottom side mean that the "shuttle" was meant to be disposable, together with it's rather pricey engines?

[RaspingLeech]

Shuttle-C is very interesting. Never heard about it before.
Does lack of wings, vertical stabilizer and thermal coating on the bottom side mean that the "shuttle" was meant to be disposable, together with it's rather pricey engines?

The final NASA design report for the Shuttle-C had two design 'generations'. This design was intended to be entirely disposable and had a similar structural design as the standard Orbiter with only two engines, but a second generation would be redesigned to include three engines and be entirely recoverable.

[TimothyC]

Shuttle-C is very interesting. Never heard about it before.
Does lack of wings, vertical stabilizer and thermal coating on the bottom side mean that the "shuttle" was meant to be disposable, together with it's rather pricey engines?

Early version of the RS-25s had a very short lifespan (less than 20 flights), and the plan was to use engines that couldn't be man-ratted anymore, but were considered to be reliable enough for uncrewed payloads and would have been sacrificed. The limiting factor would actually have been avionics which were not being replaced as quickly as the engines were. This resulted in a recoverable avionics package in the nose - with a small Apollo shaped capsule inside that nose cone.

[eswube]

Thanks for the clarification Mates!

[Judah14]

Nice work on the SLS and Shuttle-C!

[rundrewrun99]

indeed!

[CraigH]

So yesterday Space-X demonstrated reusability in the Falcon 9 Booster. They are hoping for 10 at this stage, so...2 down.
With periodic major referbishment they hope for 100 shots per Booster.

USA, Space-X Falcon 9 (2010-2017)


USA, Space-X Falcon 9 Heavy (First flight late 2017)

The current Space-X Boosters.
Hopefully the Heavy will fly by the end of the year and in 2018 that Moon flyby could maybe happen.
Space-X does tend to fall behind schedule but hey, it's only Rocket Science!
On the exciting side: Elon is already driving down launch costs among his competitors.

CraigH

[Judah14]

Nice work on the Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy! How about the Falcon Heavy version with the Dragon V2 capsule that will be used for the manned lunar flyby and the Red Dragon mission to Mars?

[CraigH]

@Judah14: A couple days after they made the anouncement of the flight plans there weren't any specifics on capsule or lifter. I want to draw but will wait untill we know exactly what the stack will be.

I think it will be the Heavy and Dragon V2. Just don't know for certain.

CraigH