I would bicycle to the hall on weekends and watch the show every time I went. I knew then that lifting bodies are not only way cool but the right way to get back down. Thanks for reminding me of where I came from!
I know what you’ve read about the Dream Chaser and how it was based on the Russian BOR-4 and all. Even NASA’s own webpage states that the HL-20, Dream Chaser’s ancestor was based on it. This is doing a disservice to all the Lifting Body work done by Dale Reed and the magnificent series of X-planes, such as the X-23, X-24A/B, the HL-10 and M2-F1/2/3.
Quote from: Rocket Science on 10/28/2011 10:05 pmI know what you’ve read about the Dream Chaser and how it was based on the Russian BOR-4 and all. Even NASA’s own webpage states that the HL-20, Dream Chaser’s ancestor was based on it. This is doing a disservice to all the Lifting Body work done by Dale Reed and the magnificent series of X-planes, such as the X-23, X-24A/B, the HL-10 and M2-F1/2/3. A small wind tunnel model was initially made by NASA Langley using photos of the BOR-4. This was used to generate the mold line of other wind tunnel models and eventually the HL-20 mockup (now the SNC Dream Chaser). BTW, the HL-20 designation was selected, tongue-in-cheek, because it was "twice as good as the HL-10." It was assumed at the time that the U.S. lifting body work may have influenced the BOR-4 design, but it became clear from wind tunnel results that the Soviets had obviously put a lot of effort in refining the shape they eventually flew to orbit 4 times.
Actually, the genesis of the BOR-4 is at the same time more complex and yet simpler than that.What would become the BOR-4 was first sketched out at the bureau of Pavel Tsybin in the late 'fifties right around the same time as Eggers was developing the M1 - the PKA. The design was eventually passed off (I'm simplfying this more than a little) to Mikoyan where it landed on Lozino-Lozinskys' desk. He developed it into the Spiral EPOS. Sub-scale tests of BOR-1, -2, and -3 models were flown in the 'sixties and 'seventies, along with the piloted MiG 105.11 (now at Zhukovskii).Rather than an adaptation of US lifting bodies, IMNSHO the BOR was a case of concurrent development.Note: Technically, there was no X-23. The sub-scale SV-5 reentry tests were simply called SV-5D/PRIME. Andreas Parsch has a discussion of this at his Designation Systems website.V/R,Edit: Added name of SV-5D program.
And predating all that, the Martin Model 410 Apollo proposal. It actually outscored NAA in the ranking, but lost as it was too different from what Faget & Co. had asked for.(last is a 3d rendering I did)
It's not a actually biconic capsule, it's the Langley M-1 lifting body shape, which was the father of the M2-F1 and the grandaddy of all other US lifting bodies...
Sort of a Bump. I seem to recall an exhibit in the Denver Museum of Natural History of the Yellowbird and the Space Station. I also am touched by the resemblence of the Martin Space Station to the Revell Space Station model of 1953.