Boeing and nasa's BETA project

this PDF talk about a TSTO system that by the wording in the document was very far along to a TSTO system being viable

i would love to hear what y'all think about this

BETA and BETA 2

link 2

From the diagrams in the linked document, the payload capacity of the orbital vehicle appears disproportionately limited given the size of orbital vehicle itself.

Bottom line:

It doesn’t appear to be an economically reasonable solution.

originally posted by: Bhadhidar
From the diagrams in the linked document, the payload capacity of the orbital vehicle appears disproportionately limited given the size of orbital vehicle itself.

Bottom line:

It doesn’t appear to be an economically reasonable solution.

Not to mention a really old dated design

Looks like a mig25 fox bat with rockets slapped to the side

a reply to: TritonTaranis

thats the point

originally posted by: penroc3
a reply to: TritonTaranis

thats the point

While the MIG-25 is a masterpiece of engineering with all its flaws

It’s dated

This project is dated

a reply to: TritonTaranis

There is an obsession on ATS about a certain era of fastmovers and TSTO concepts. They seem to NEED that something worked and was out there. And when they are told that particular project went nowhere, they come back again in a few months or years and ask again. There's one user in particular who is obsessed to the point it almost sounds like a job assignment.

Design studies are a dime a dozen.

a reply to: anzha

iagree with you on 97% of what you said.

BUT if you read the PDF's i posted you will see that they did fly test articles of a TSTO and it went so well they moed onto BETA II and than BETA III.

i was mearly posting this as an interesting relic from the past and not as a 'gotcha' post.

and if you follow some of the people listed in the reference sections they are some people who had amazing carriers and positions in JPL/NASA/AF and than they just disappear as far as publishing goes


sometimes a post is just a post because someone found it interesting, and honestly they sounded like they were on the right path but just dropped it and that is always a sad thing to see.

a reply to: penroc3

I don't see anything about flying test articles in those documents. They had wind tunnel models of the later iterations but that's it.
It's possible the original Air Force design or something close to it evolved in a different direction but that's speculation.

a reply to: penroc3

Flying test articles can be as simple as scale models that are released. It can also be specific components. I'd say I doubt there was anything like a full scale airframe flown.

And the USAF is notorious for 'not invented here' syndrome. The brass wants their planes blue from start to finish. It's not just the USAF: the USN is just as bad.

Projects get started all the time. Do some small scale tests and are abandoned just as fast. Wind tunnel models were made all that freakin time. 99.999% of them never went anywhere.

a reply to: anzha

the mother ship reminds me of what the Germans saw from tikaboo peak

they said they saw a large aircraft that had exhaust ports you could park a car in and that it was very very fast.


it seems like they could have totally done what they were outlining in that report, and i was wrong i misread it and thought they had something other than wind tunnel and computer data.

Very much interested in this project
Strange rumors when I was back on the ranch back in the late 80s/early 90s
Not my project though
Almost look like courtroom sketches not concept art
Esp. first four
Be interesting to do geographic matches on landmarks
Looks familiar but desert is big
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a reply to: t34r3b

How does the orbiter separate from the mothership without breaking it’s vertical stabilizers?

Doesn’t the pdf read like the Boeing Beta actually existed in some form since that program gave them so much data they deem reliable?

originally posted by: PhantomTwo
a reply to: t34r3b

How does the orbiter separate from the mothership without breaking it’s vertical stabilizers?

Doesn’t the pdf read like the Boeing Beta actually existed in some form since that program gave them so much data they deem reliable?

On their Twitter.
"These space crafts can reach orbit on their own, dock with other spacecraft or fly alone."
Seems non-hypothetical

Vert stabilizers seem problematic agreed
Turbulence/sudden lateral excursions seem like biggest issues
"Cutouts" in 1st stage craft wider than VS also seems problematic aerodynamically
Would not want to be on either craft during separation
Enough failures on wing-mounts to make nervous with this setup
Then again it seems like some issues solved

Very different language when talking about testing vs. future use

WRT performance

In spite of these weight increases, the Beta II vehicle was able to complete the design mission of delivering and returning a 10,000 lb payload to low Earth polar orbit with a gross weight of approximately 1.1 Mlb utilizing only airbreathing propulsion for the initial ascent

WRT use w/space station

The results of this study are shown in Figure 13. The dotted line indicates the point at which redesign of the orbiter internal packing, i.e., resizing of the fuel tanks and payload bay, would be required to fulfill the mission. For payloads above the dotted line, no repackaging would be necessary. For those below the dotted line, resizing of the fuel tanks and payload bay and repackaging would be necessary to complete the mission. As can be seen, performing the design mission to low Earth polar orbit when staging at a Mach number below 6.5 would require repackaging of the orbiter. This result was expected, since the Beta-131 orbiter was designed for staging at Mach 6.5. The maximum payload capability of the orbiter ascending to a nominal Space Station orbit is approximately 17,500 lb when staging at Mach 6.5. A 20,000 lb payload could be delivered to a low equatorial orbit at the same staging Mach number.

Past tense vs. future tense.
Telling in my opinion

a reply to: t34r3b

i thought the same.

you have to remember this was in the very early 90's so they didn't have the computers that we have today to crunch the number, to me it sounds like they actually built a flew these things either together or 'as advertised'.

and the question i have is what are they bringing back that weighs 10,000 lbs? kidnapping other sats seems like a very risky maneuver if you got spotted or had an accident in orbit.


these beta aircraft seem to fit allot of the strange highspeed aircraft seen or heard around that time.

a reply to: penroc3

Also, why Beta? What was Alpha?

a reply to: PhantomTwo

this i think
www.thespacereview.com...