Future Americans and Russians Space Transport Crafts.

USA :

The HyperSoar is a B-52 sized hypersonic bomber/recon aircraft concept under investigation by US DoE's Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and University of Maryland. If developed, it would have the capability to take-off from the US and deliver its goods anywhere in the world in a couple of hours without refueling. It's speed(Mach 10) and altitude will make it near impossible to track it, much less bring it down. It's chief designer is Preston Carter

Hypersoar will fly only at 'the edge of space' - 60 km - however, it needs technology that will more than just distinguish it from 'conventional' airplanes.

From : Link







Russia :

As a part of a scientific-investigative program "Eagle" ordered by Russian Space Agency, investigations are being held in various design bureau on a possible development of a reusable single-stage space vehicle.

From 1993 till 1996 works on the "Eagle" program were done at OKB Zhukovsky, OKB Keldysh, and OKB Baranov etc. Statistics show that fully reusable single- or double-stage carrier fitted with various engines would be 30% lighter and much more cost-efficient as compared to "Space Shuttle" or the "Energy-Buran" system. Maximum cargo-capacity of the vehicle would be about 10-20 tones.

Among presented projects of a single-stage space-crafts were Tu-2000, Mig-2000, and modification of the "Neva" apparatus. Western analogue is NASP (USA).

Mig-2000 ( The Mig2000 is NOT the Mig I-2000 ! ) is a reusable space-vehicle with 300t take-off weight and 9t payload is capable of delivering loads to the 200km orbit at 51� inclination. The sled would accelerate the space-craft to M=0.8 and then air-breathing propulsion with subsonic combustion would accelerate it to M=5. Propellants wer slush hydrogen and liquid oxygen. The vehicle would have 3000km re-entry cross-range.

Final favor was given to the Tu-2000 project.

From : Link


Tupolev TU-2000



TU-2000 Pic ( X-Large )

TU-2000 Pic01

TU-2000 Pic02

Mig 2000

Mig-2000 Pic ( X-large )






[Edited on 11-1-2003 by ultra_phoenix]

The Hypersoar concept was acquired from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in 2002 by DARPA and combined with the USAF's X-41 Common Aero Vehicle (CAV) experimental hypersonic reentry vehicle project to create the FALCON (Force Application and Launch from Continental US) program, which called for a quick-response global strike capability to any point on earth from within the United States.

The Cosmopolis S-21 spaceplane was designed by the Myasishchev EMZ in the early 2000s as the Russian equivalent of the Scaled Composites Tier One program that produced the SpaceShipOne, and it would have been launched from an M-55. However, the Cosmopolis S-21 project never progressed beyond a full-scale mockup.

Links:
web.archive.org...://newsline.llnl.gov/employee/articles/2001/10-05-12-hypersoar.html
www.designation-systems.net...
www.astronautix.com...