Cult Spacecraft

[starviking]

There's the first of an occasional series on 'Cult Spacecraft' up on SpaceDaily.

They're starting with the X-20. It certainly is an eye-opener, but I'll reserve judgement until the vernerable sages have commented (That's you folks!)

Here's the link: http://www.space-travel.com/reports/Cult_spacecraft_Part_One_The_Little_Spaceplane_That_Could_Not_999.html

 

[Barrington Bond]

Very perturbing but I guess he is right...

Barry :'(

 

[Orionblamblam]

Very perturbing but I guess he is right...

On some things, lacking on others:
1) 5-seat ferry:
"Every cult web page about Dyna-Soar shows a cross-section of an "X-20X" 5-seat space station crew ferry configuration - but if you look closely you see that the escape rocket has been removed and the passengers are crammed in so close that ejection is impossible."

Actually, if you look closely you can see that the abort rocket on all the operational variants has been *replaced*, not removed.

2) Synergetic Orbital Plane Change:
The author of this idea seems to have forgotten that Dyna-Soar didn't have a rocket engine - all its delta-vee was in the partly-fueled Titan III transtage. With the flimsy and explosive transtage still attached, this maneuver is quite impossible.

Which was why in this variant the rocket engine was contained within a *new* propulsion system, packaged to survive the maneuver.


He makes a number of good points, and I generally agree with his assessment... but he's done some shoddy homework.