Author Topic: The Buran Thread  (Read 637847 times)

Offline Spacenick

  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Posts: 307
  • Liked: 4
  • Likes Given: 1
Re: The Buran Thread
« Reply #660 on: 06/06/2008 01:04 pm »
It was usefull as a test for the system and it could have been developed to do more things automated, like docking with MIR. Let's not forget the Buran wasn't finihed when the program ended. I find it quite respect less, to put things as simple as you are putting it. There is no ground for calling either of these two systems superior if only one had the political support to live on, you can talk about advantages and disadvantages in the planned design, but you can't judge the design by it's only test flight other than acknowledging that it's principles were feasible, as far as we know.

It's not Buran that failed, it's communism that did!

I have every reason to believe that during their development and operation these two vehicles have seen the best engineers and scientists in the world working on them on both sides of the fence and to believe that no team was superior to the other, while the Russian team might have had an advantage in knowledge due to the fact that they could learn from their colleagues.
So please keep this discussion respectful and don't blame failures of politicians on the people working on great projects.

Offline dwmzmm

  • Extreme Veteran
  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 733
  • Far West Houston, TX
    • Challenger 498 NAR Section
  • Liked: 5
  • Likes Given: 0
Re: The Buran Thread
« Reply #661 on: 06/06/2008 09:39 pm »
Let's not forget that it's very possible that if the Soviets weren't the first to launch Sputnik and Vostok, the USA probably wouldn't have had the incentive to be the first to put a man on the moon.
Dave, NAR # 21853 SR.

Offline Spacenick

  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Posts: 307
  • Liked: 4
  • Likes Given: 1
Re: The Buran Thread
« Reply #662 on: 06/06/2008 10:03 pm »
Which might not have happened without the Germans doing stupid things with good rockets. That's the bad part of most of our modern technology there is very few that would have developed as fast as it did without the war.

Offline Crispy

  • Member
  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 1025
  • London
  • Liked: 783
  • Likes Given: 51
Re: The Buran Thread
« Reply #663 on: 06/07/2008 12:57 pm »
Which might never have happened if the Germans had been allowed to develop artillery after WW1

Offline brueyh1976

  • Armchair Astronaut
  • Full Member
  • **
  • Posts: 246
  • Southampton, UK
  • Liked: 1
  • Likes Given: 3
Re: The Buran Thread
« Reply #664 on: 06/08/2008 02:17 am »
What an interesting thread on what might have been, I just hope that the surviving Buran orbiters can be preserved in some form as they are an important part of the Russian space programme.
"Disovery, Houston - Roll Program"  "Roger Roll Discovery"

Offline MrTim

  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 731
  • Liked: 21
  • Likes Given: 0
Re: The Buran Thread
« Reply #665 on: 06/08/2008 05:58 pm »
(snip) It's not Buran that failed, it's communism that did!
There are plenty of universities in the US where that might not be accepted as true  :D
I have every reason to believe that during their development and operation these two vehicles have seen the best engineers and scientists in the world working on them on both sides of the fence (snip)
Agreed, and congratulations to all those who worked on both systems for getting them to function as well as they did given the resources each were given and the demands made. These vehicles have both had to fly in an unimaginably difficult combination of aerodynamic and thermal conditions; for both vehicles to do it successfully on their first flights is quite an achievement.

(snip) the Russian team might have had an advantage in knowledge due to the fact that they could learn from their colleagues.
Might? oh, come-on now... the Buran crew hatch is even on the same side of the fuselage!  :D  The reluctance of some to admit how much of the Buran was influenced by the US design is sort of amusing and has always generated a few laughs over here; I presume it's wrapped-up in national pride on the Russian side, but I suspect the Buran would have been more-respected by people on this side of the ocean if the influence had been openly admitted rather than denied back when it flew. The US program was operated publicly, so it was not exactly unexpected that others would see it as an example (both for good and ill) The reluctance to admit the level of influence makes about as much sense as it would for the US to not admit it was influenced by German rocket builders.  :)

So please keep this discussion respectful and don't blame failures of politicians on the people working on great projects.
I think we can all respect the work that went into Buran, w/o regard to the influence of the US program (which we can all be free to agree/disagree about). I, for one, wish they had made a minimum of one more flight of the same vehicle so we would know if was indeed re-usable. A manned flight would have been nice, so the vehicle could have been moved from the "robotic vehicle" category to the "manned vehicle" category. It would have been a very neat thing had the US and Russia both been able to service ISS by orbiter; it might have even influenced the US to do a second-generation shuttle rather than killing the program, and might have driven the partners to build a larger ISS with greater crew capacity.

Offline Spacenick

  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Posts: 307
  • Liked: 4
  • Likes Given: 1
Re: The Buran Thread
« Reply #666 on: 06/08/2008 08:14 pm »
Well, bringing the whole team of Wernherr von Braun over the pond is not really being influenced^^ Though, it's absolutely clear they were more than willing to come to the US, after all sending things into the sky was that they cared for and that could be done best in the US.
The thing about the Space Shuttle derivate in Buran is that it's pretty mixed.
While the aeronynamics design of the Orbiter and therefor its physics for descent were direcect copies of the Space Shuttle Orbiter, the method to put Buran into Orbit was completely different from the American approach.

Offline buran.fr

  • Veteran
  • Full Member
  • *
  • Posts: 135
  • Paris
  • Liked: 0
  • Likes Given: 0
Re: The Buran Thread
« Reply #667 on: 06/13/2008 07:10 am »
The Buran OK-GLI was transported in the exhibition hangar of the museum on Wednesday June 11, <a href="http://www.buran-energia.com/bourane-buran/bourane-modele-gli-technik museum sinsheim speyer.php#Building_entrance">here are some pictures[/url].

Offline Skylab

  • Member
  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 477
  • Liked: 71
  • Likes Given: 55
Re: The Buran Thread
« Reply #668 on: 06/13/2008 03:44 pm »
The Buran OK-GLI was transported in the exhibition hangar of the museum on Wednesday June 11

Pictures of the 'Analog' inside the actual hangar are here .

Offline shuttlelegs

  • Regular
  • Full Member
  • **
  • Posts: 202
  • Gladstone Qld Australia
  • Liked: 12
  • Likes Given: 8
Re: The Buran Thread
« Reply #669 on: 06/20/2008 03:06 pm »
Iam glad she's got a good final home.
Back in Sydney Australia in 2001 when I first saw her she kind of looked lonely. I was the only one there and I spent while over a hour looking her over specialy in the payload bay. Hope to see her again soon.

Offline dwmzmm

  • Extreme Veteran
  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 733
  • Far West Houston, TX
    • Challenger 498 NAR Section
  • Liked: 5
  • Likes Given: 0
Re: The Buran Thread
« Reply #670 on: 06/20/2008 09:26 pm »
Nice pictures; is that a full scale model of the 747 in those last several pictures?
Dave, NAR # 21853 SR.

Offline Felix

  • Expert
  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 1820
  • Europe.GER.bw
  • Liked: 9
  • Likes Given: 0
Re: The Buran Thread
« Reply #671 on: 06/22/2008 12:14 am »
Nice pictures; is that a full scale model of the 747 in those last several pictures?
It is/was a real 747 (D-ABYM 21588 "Schleswig-Holdstein")
Photos: http://www.museumspeyer.de/00004193132A_D4E3D357_00001060_0001.html

The museum group also owns an Antonov AN-22, a Tupolev TU-144 ("russian Concorde") and a Concorde (F-BVFB).
For more, see: http://www.technik-museum.de/uk/

Picture of the Antonov AN-22 (taken by me):
« Last Edit: 06/22/2008 12:15 am by Felix »

Offline publiusr

  • Elite Veteran
  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 1539
  • Liked: 1
  • Likes Given: 2
Re: The Buran Thread
« Reply #672 on: 06/26/2008 06:41 pm »
Quite a collection of aircraft. Good to see Igor Volk's ride being taken care of.

There is a new model kit of this craft.
http://www.starshipmodeler.net/talk/viewtopic.php?t=63060

Offline buran.fr

  • Veteran
  • Full Member
  • *
  • Posts: 135
  • Paris
  • Liked: 0
  • Likes Given: 0
Re: The Buran Thread
« Reply #673 on: 06/26/2008 09:09 pm »
There is a new model kit of this craft.
http://www.starshipmodeler.net/talk/viewtopic.php?t=63060

I noticed it too, I'm going to buy at least all the buran's related kits.
Poor CB  :'(

Offline Suzy

  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 625
  • Melbourne, Australia
    • RuSpace - my Russian spaceflight website!
  • Liked: 40
  • Likes Given: 187
Re: The Buran Thread
« Reply #674 on: 07/05/2008 03:41 am »
Iam glad she's got a good final home.
Back in Sydney Australia in 2001 when I first saw her she kind of looked lonely. I was the only one there and I spent while over a hour looking her over specialy in the payload bay. Hope to see her again soon.

Did you take any photos? I was hoping the exhibition would come to Melbourne, but was disappointed when the company went bankrupt!

Offline STS Tony

  • Extreme Veteran
  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 1677
  • Los Angeles
  • Liked: 53
  • Likes Given: 106
Re: The Buran Thread
« Reply #675 on: 07/07/2008 02:00 am »
Are there any more viable Burans that could be saved like the last one?

Offline buran.fr

  • Veteran
  • Full Member
  • *
  • Posts: 135
  • Paris
  • Liked: 0
  • Likes Given: 0
Re: The Buran Thread
« Reply #676 on: 07/07/2008 08:06 am »
There is Buran 1.02 which is in Baikonur (but it's the property of Kazkhstan).
The other ones were not fully completed.

It seems that Sinsheim & Speyer was also interested by 2.01. But she is in a realy bad shape now.

Offline buran.fr

  • Veteran
  • Full Member
  • *
  • Posts: 135
  • Paris
  • Liked: 0
  • Likes Given: 0
Re: The Buran Thread
« Reply #677 on: 08/05/2008 08:04 am »
Hi,
I made a new small site:

Buran is often considerated as a poor copy of the american shuttle just because it looks similar (in shape), but the differences are deeper, that’s why I made a comparison (buran.su) between the 2 systems, STS and Buran-Energia. This comparison is based on the mains functionnalities of the launchers and shuttles, on-board computer, engines, dimensions, etc…

Moreover, I compared the 2 systems in their begining, because Buran didn’t evolved.

Tell me if I made mistakes or mis-interpretation.  ;)

Offline DmitryP

  • Member
  • Posts: 48
  • Liked: 1
  • Likes Given: 0
Re: The Buran Thread
« Reply #678 on: 08/31/2008 03:40 pm »
Vadim Lukashevitch at his site presented a new version of the screensaver showing realistic animation of various Soviet spacecrafts (actual and planned). Now with English controls and small English description. For everybody who would like to see how spacecrafts operate in near Earth space.

http://www.buran.ru/htm/scr_en.htm

Offline Oersted

  • Member
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2897
  • Liked: 4098
  • Likes Given: 2773
Re: The Buran Thread
« Reply #679 on: 09/08/2008 03:50 pm »
This Buran looks in OK shape, more or less, where is it, does anybody know?

http://englishrussia.com/?p=2006#more-2006

 

Advertisement NovaTech
Advertisement Northrop Grumman
Advertisement
Advertisement Margaritaville Beach Resort South Padre Island
Advertisement Brady Kenniston
Advertisement NextSpaceflight
Advertisement Nathan Barker Photography
1