Russian Launch Vehicles and their Spacecraft: Thoughts & News

GunshipDemocracy wrote:

KiloGolf wrote:

the real argument made, the US having more pull in the field.

Delta IV has ever carried more on LEO than Proton-M? when more then 21 tons?

It has the capability to do so, hence more pull. The fact that it did not is purely market-related.

KiloGolf wrote:Yeap, cause you had nothing to counter the real argument made, the US having more pull in the field.

No counter?  The fact that Russia has its own stable of indigenously developed space launchers that satisfy 100% of Russian requirements, whether it is national security payloads or civilian birds? That Russia can guarantee its access to space despite any conceivable action from those arrogant dikwads in Washington or Brussels?  That Russia is one of only 2 nations that can currently put human into space? I find it hilarious that people like you constantly harangue and disparage Russian competencies and capabilities, yet come from a country that cannot launch a firecracker above 1,000m without help....

Yeah sure, console yourself with past glories from ~2000 years ago when Greece was a civilisational harbinger of classic enlightment.  These days, you guys excel at nothing but running up obscene debt, making Souvlaki, and conceding territory to the Turks.

https://ria.ru/space/20180622/1523187734.html?referrer_block=index_main_5

Rogozin has announced the end of the Proton. The current round of contracts will be completed by construction will
stop as they dry up and the final move to the Angara will be made.

I think it is about time. The Proton is a waste of money since it does not have the economies of scale, unlike the
Angara.

GunshipDemocracy wrote:

KiloGolf wrote:
It has the capability to do so, hence more pull. The fact that it did not is purely market-related.

So facts are
a) Delta has so far ued only up to 21 tons LEO capacity
b) Proton-M LEO is 23 tons Delta according to wiki 23 (68) or 26 (68A engine). is this soo much more for a newer rocket?

a) D4H: 28,370 kg LEO
b) D4H: 14,210 kg GTO
c) D4H > Proton-M

GunshipDemocracy wrote:

kvs wrote:
I think it is about time.   The Proton is a waste of money since it does not have the economies of scale, unlike the
Angara.

+ Angara as  modular design and less toxic fuel has better PR too.


I just wonder if there will be Angara 100 build as well or only Soyuz 6 heavy toll be basic carrier rocket of Russian federation?
The questions is would  Baikal replace URM boosters?

Angara 100 is just Krunichev PR, same as Angara A-7. Self promotional stuff, not to be taken seriously in the absence of any federal gov interest. Soyuz 5 will fulfill the 17T slot and be the basis for clusters for 80T and greater. A-5 will fulfill the 25T slot, with further upgrades increasing this to 35T and upwards.

Fly-back strap-on concept was originally envisioned as part of the re-usability upgrades for the Energia/Buran/Vulkan family, but was shrunk down to Baikal post-USSR to be a fit for Angara. I'd expect that any operational Baikal would supplement URMs, not replace.

GunshipDemocracy wrote:
Delta IV Heavy since 2004 United States ULA ~21,000 kg (46,000 lb)[8][a]Orion EFT-1 5 December 2014
Proton-M since 2001[c] Russia Khrunichev 22,776 kg (50,212 lb) 12 July 2000

Nope, we're talking specs. D4H > Proton-M
Cargo is always confo for most Delta missions as it's not a NASA rocket, so nobody needs to brag. This isn't a field where marketing has any relevance. The actual system is just more capable than anything Russians field.

D4H is a frickin beast.





https://www.ulalaunch.com/rockets/delta-iv

D4H lifts 25,980 kgs to LEO @ 51.6 degrees
Proton-M lifts 23,000 kgs to LEO @ 51.5 degrees

DH4 leads by ~3T...

On the other hand...

DH4 costs 350M. Proton costs 65M.
DH4 uses hydrolox on all stages. Proton uses lower energy hypergolics.
DH4 first flew in 2004. Proton-M first flew in 2001, though its basic design first flew in 1965.

Meh... comparative dick-measuring is rarely a useful activity... Bottom line is Proton does what it was intended to do. DH4 does it better, but at more than 6x the cost.

https://www.rt.com/news/433955-roscosmos-heavy-rocket-soyuz/

Tsar-rocket: Russia starts developing ultra-heavy Soyuz-5 launch vehicle

miketheterrible wrote:https://www.rt.com/news/433955-roscosmos-heavy-rocket-soyuz/

Tsar-rocket: Russia starts developing ultra-heavy Soyuz-5 launch vehicle

The article has a gross error

Sources say the 62-meter-long Soyuz-5 is drafted as a medium-capacity launcher with a takeoff mass of about 270 tons. It will replace the lighter Soyuz-2 and will be capable of delivering 9 tons to a low orbit, three times as much as the latest Soyuz-2.1b can do now.

The Soyuz-5 is a Zenit replacement using the RD-171 four nozzle engine. Its payload to LEO is over 17 tons and not 9.

miketheterrible wrote:https://www.rt.com/news/433955-roscosmos-heavy-rocket-soyuz/

Tsar-rocket: Russia starts developing ultra-heavy Soyuz-5 launch vehicle

Skewing reality there, it's merely a ''we're working on it, sir" after Vlad had a go at them.

Putin challenges Roscosmos to “drastically improve” on space and launch

WASHINGTON — Russian President Vladimir Putin called on Roscosmos to meet deadlines for the nation’s future Angara, Soyuz-5 and “super-heavy class” rockets while fixing quality-control issues that have dogged Russian spacecraft and launch vehicles in recent years.

According to the Kremlin’s published transcript of Putin’s remarks during a July 18 meeting with the state-run space corporation Roscosmos, Putin said it “is necessary to drastically improve the quality and reliability of space and launch vehicles” and to preserve Russia’s increasingly threatened leadership in space.

https://spacenews.com/putin-challenges-roscosmos-to-drastically-improve-on-space-and-launch/

If they don't change course, Soyuz-5 will be mathematically over-budget and late.

PapaDragon wrote:

miketheterrible wrote:https://www.rt.com/news/433955-roscosmos-heavy-rocket-soyuz/

Tsar-rocket: Russia starts developing ultra-heavy Soyuz-5 launch vehicle

They started developing many things over the years, signed many papers, published many concept arts and even made some scale models.

Let's hope that whoever is working on this project is more intelligent than person who wrote this article because other than last paragraph everything else there is factually incorrect.

And using phrase "tsar-something" doesn't make them look witty, that joke is century past expiration date.

What do you expect? It's RT.

Tass one is better read.

PapaDragon wrote:

miketheterrible wrote:https://www.rt.com/news/433955-roscosmos-heavy-rocket-soyuz/

Tsar-rocket: Russia starts developing ultra-heavy Soyuz-5 launch vehicle

They started developing many things over the years, signed many papers, published many concept arts and even made some scale models.

Let's hope that whoever is working on this project is more intelligent than person who wrote this article because other than last paragraph everything else there is factually incorrect.

And using phrase "tsar-something" doesn't make them look witty, that joke is century past expiration date.

This RT article is a shockingly INCOMPETENT piece of writing.  The idiot "journalist" simply copied chunks from a previous article from 2015 when the Soyuz-5 was intended as a methalox replacement for Soyuz-2 family, ie it predates the re-purposing of the Soyuz-5 name for the current Zenit-replacement project.  Thats why this muppet is talking about 9T to LEO instead of 17T...

Original 2015 article below:

https://www.rt.com/news/312757-progress-soyuz-5-rocket-kirilin/

P.S Rogozin should FIRE whoever the foxtrot decided to use the Soyuz-5 name for Fenix/Sunkar core. The prospective train-wreck of misinfo and confusion should have been readily apparent to anyone.

It appears that the original Soyuz-5 project is not quite dead since they are proceeding with the engine development.

I think it is highly likely that Soyuz-2 will be retired and replaced by a "Soyuz-5" powered by CH4-LOX engines. It
will be a man rated rocket and will not competed with Angara or Sunkar.

Oh boy, a collaboration vs one nation. And yet the European space industry is still in Russia's dust.

When EU builds their own space station, doesn't rely on 50% of it being Russian and actually have their alternative to GPS and Glonass in active service, come back. Not impressive for such a large collaboration.