Lockheed Martin X-33 & Venture Star

flateric

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Till it's still there, grab one of the last videos LM released on program - right before tank failure
http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/_docs/vid11099801.mpeg
 
It is to bad that they did not listen to the chief designer that they where not using the right material for the tank.
 
Enjoy! Promo #3 is one of the most idiotic aerospace ads (at least its beginning) that I've ever seen, though

Lockheed VentureStar Promo #1 - 'The Odyssey Begins'

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27I3R5ZkNO4

Lockheed VentureStar Promo #2 - 'Monolith'

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4KUWIy18QW8

Lockheed VentureStar Promo #3 - 'Extraordinary Vehicle'

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RKDtXgfiFI4

Lockheed VentureStar Promo #4 - 'Genesis'

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2DRvr1nh-zk
 
LASRE tests

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sgy89YtgUSM
 
Johnbr said:
It is to bad that they did not listen to the chief designer that they where not using the right material for the tank.
Unfortunately, that wouldn't have been enough. We're just not able to have lightweight arbitrary-shaped liquid hydrogen tanks right now. Materials science is not yet where it needs to be to make that feasible.

It's not just an if-only-they'd-listened-to-Bob scenario.
 
More info on the X-33 on the NASA board

http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2006/01/x-33venturestar-what-really-happened/

Big thread

http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=1184.0
 
flateric said:
Enjoy! Promo #3 is one of the most idiotic aerospace ads (at least its beginning) that I've ever seen, though

Forget about the 'aerospace' - it may be the most idiotic ad I've ever seen.
 
Hi,

http://www.thespacereview.com/article/44/1
 

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carmelo said:
The music of promo-1 is wonderfull!
What is?

"Water Music Suite, No.2 for Orchestra in D major, HWV 349: Alla Hornpipe" by George Frideric Handel is at the beginning of Promo 1 and then "The Blue Danube Waltz" by Johann Strauss II.
 
starviking said:
flateric said:
Enjoy! Promo #3 is one of the most idiotic aerospace ads (at least its beginning) that I've ever seen, though

Forget about the 'aerospace' - it may be the most idiotic ad I've ever seen.

Nothing narrated by the great James Coburn is idiotic ;)
 
Apparent X-33 component assembly:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/firegroundphotos/sets/72157621889436520/with/3770595135/
 
Unreal waste of NASA tax dollars, to build and invest to that point then just walk away....what happened to the old NASA "failure is not an option". Appears it died with the Apollo program along with the NASA that put men on the moon. Plain to see why NASA of the 21st century is a bankrupt going nowhere pork based job for vote’s grounded program. What a tragic shame and waste of a once great organization.....classic government based organization. None of them should be allowed to exist for over 15 years they become bloated dark holes of endless spending, corruption and inefficiency.
 
iirc, Dad worked for a contractor based in Utica, MI called Citation that manufactured the tooling to make the tanks... as you can imagine, a lot of headaches came with that job.
 
airrocket said:
Unreal waste of NASA tax dollars, to build and invest to that point then just walk away....what happened to the old NASA "failure is not an option". Appears it died with the Apollo program along with the NASA that put men on the moon. Plain to see why NASA of the 21st century is a bankrupt going nowhere pork based job for vote’s grounded program. What a tragic shame and waste of a once great organization.....classic government based organization. None of them should be allowed to exist for over 15 years they become bloated dark holes of endless spending, corruption and inefficiency.

There is such a thing as cutting your losses. there was no point in continuing.

also the last sentence is unwarranted blankets statement.
 
From the recent Air & Space article:
http://www.airspacemag.com/military-aviation/secrets-skunk-works-180952122/

02s_jj14_e5c6057_live.jpg__800x0_q85_crop.jpg




Intended as an operational follow-on to the X-33 suborbital spaceplane technology demonstrator, the single-stage-to-orbit VentureStar never left the drawing board. Skunk Works pitched a mission-ready version, carrying a payload of two Militarized Space Planes and 16 Common Aero Vehicles (warhead-equipped hypersonic gliders), to the Air Force with this 20-inch-long stereo lithograph model, made in 1999.


Payload is made for trouble... 16 MIRVs/CAVs and 2 "mini" X-37s!!?? :eek:
 
does it really shoot does mirvs upward once over target??? or does it roll upside down and shooting it down???
 
abheiden said:
does it really shoot does mirvs upward once over target??? or does it roll upside down and shooting it down???

"The enemy's gate is down."

There is no Up or Down in space except in relation to another object or reference point.
 
Hello everyone,

I was wondering if anyone had a copy of the graphic that was on the Lockheed X-33 website, showing the 5 or 6 test launches from Edwards.

It showed the suborbital trajectories getting higher and faster, up to the final test which would land at, IIRC, somewhere in Montana.

Any other info, details would be greatly appreciated.

TTR
 
You mean this one?

http://www.nasa.gov/centers/langley/news/releases/1999/Feb99/99-008.html
 

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I think that's it. I'm sure I remember it having more flights on it (Maybe up to 5?), and being a bit... nicer? less 90's CGI i think is what I mean. It maybe that I dreamed it!

But still, good find, thanks MoonBat!

TTR
 
Cutaway of the x-33 and pdf on it.
http://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/album/pdf-ww2/p25874-x-33.html
 

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What a stupid, idiotic concept - as we Germans say: "nicht Fisch und nicht Fleisch". Late in the last millennium I did a quantitative comparative analysis of the two VTHL X-33 configurations by Rockwell and LM for the ESA FESTIP program, and the Skunk Works design ended up having a larger combined wing and body wetted area (and associated structural mass) than the classical Rockwell cylindrical body with wings for the same design mission, while even the nominally VTVL McDonnell Douglas concept derived from the Delta Clipper/DC-X all of a sudden started sprouting fins for reentry, much like Musk's current Starship. Coupled with the complex non-cylindrical tankage of the lifting body that failed in the actual X-33 demonstrator manufacturing, the takeaway message, as always, is KISS, but program cycles these days are apparently just too long and too few and far between for many actual lessons learned to be passed on to the next generation of engineers and designers. But even Musk, god bless his heart, is going with cylindrical fuselages with distinct fins and wings these days, so there is some hope for sanity yet.
 
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The X-33 was supposed to hit Mach 15. When ascent to orbit is Mach 26. Ok it was to be a demonstrator for Venture Star; but it ended so overweight it fell to Mach 12 and then even lower.
I readily agree that program was silly from day one - July 1996... 25 years ago.
 
I don't think the X-33 program per se was unrealistic, and I still believe the Rockwell concept based on actual Space Shuttle experience was the most promising design, but NASA apparently instead went for the next shiny thing in the form of a "stretch goal" rather than the most readily achievable solution. And then there is the X-34 hangar queen as well. Blacken the sky with X-vehicles - yeah, right...
 
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I don't know. Propellant mass fraction is hard. The rocket equation is truly horrible. Chemical rocket sucks. Earth is just a little too big for chemical rockets - Venus size, density and gravity pull would have helped.
Every single parameter in the equation is seemingly pig-headed against us, poor humans.
Musk nailed it perfectly in a few words

"We are living on the wrong planet for SSTO. Mars, no problem." He could have added: Moon and even Venus. Or Mercury.
 
Could that linear aerospike work better on Phil Bono's very larger saucer HLLV....I could see it between the two vertical fins...perhaps with Big Onion type water landings....except of a skimming sort.

I like the idea of very wide, flat payloads that could offer....even wider than that afforded by OTRAG's largest cluster concept.
 
I don't know. Propellant mass fraction is hard. The rocket equation is truly horrible. Chemical rocket sucks. Earth is just a little too big for chemical rockets - Venus size, density and gravity pull would have helped.
Every single parameter in the equation is seemingly pig-headed against us, poor humans.
Musk nailed it perfectly in a few words

"We are living on the wrong planet for SSTO. Mars, no problem." He could have added: Moon and even Venus. Or Mercury.
I completely agree that SSTOs are at the very least impractical with current technology, but the X-33 itself was never intended to go orbital. However, if in the best of universes the Rockwell design would have been picked, built, and successfully flown, you now have a configuration that could in principle serve as a reusable booster as well as orbiter of a fully reusable parallel staged VTHL TSTO RLV, either with optimized stage sizes or even as a (near) bimese.
 
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Could that linear aerospike work better on Phil Bono's very larger saucer HLLV....I could see it between the two vertical fins...perhaps with Big Onion type water landings....except of a skimming sort.

I like the idea of very wide, flat payloads that could offer....even wider than that afforded by OTRAG's largest cluster concept.

Somewhere on YouTube, (I can't find it atm) is a fascinating video of the 'belly-landing' tests done on the Lenticular Reentry Vehicle concept both on land and in the water. The HLLV "might" be a bit different due to the size but in general while landing on the heat shield worked great on land, water was a whole different story. And not a good one :)
(See: https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/AD0263072.pdf and https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/19980228014/downloads/19980228014.pdf)

Randy
 

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