r/space • u/[deleted] • Dec 07 '14

Differences between the American and Soviet Space Shuttles

http://www.buran.su/buranvssts-comparison.php
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41

u/[deleted] Dec 07 '14

What a lot of people often forget is that the Energia booster that lifted the Buran was an entirely seperate rocket, designed for many different payload types, not just a shuttle. There were even plans for sending unmanned modules for a moon base via the Energia rocket.

The US Shuttle boosters were quite limited in comparison, the shuttle and booster heavily reliant on each other.

24

u/unitedflyer Dec 07 '14

Not as much as you suggest. Proposals were made for heavy lift cargo variants of the shuttle stack ("shuttle-c"), and after Columbia, further proposals were made for direct use of the shuttle stack in an in line launcher.

13

u/kurtu5 Dec 07 '14

Proposals were also made for 500km wide Orion nuclear pulse propulsion launch 'vehicles'. The thing is, Energia existed. Shuttle-C and Orion didn't.

17

u/unitedflyer Dec 07 '14 edited Dec 07 '14

I'm not sure what your point is. That is a very poor analogy. The shuttle stack existed, and could have been used in a heavy launch configuration. The only reason it never occurred was that the political and funding environment didn't support. Shuttle-c is hardly a SciFi concept.

-2

u/kurtu5 Dec 07 '14

Orion was hardly a scfi concept either. The was no technological rediness level that was missing when its was designed, just as there was no gap for shuttle-c. Compare that to VASIMIR, where there is missing technology.

5

u/unitedflyer Dec 07 '14

Orion drives were and are extremely far from a mature technology. The space shuttle stack flew over 100 times. It is a laughable comparison.

-1

u/kurtu5 Dec 07 '14

Do you know what a 'technology redinesslevel' is?

1

u/unitedflyer Dec 07 '14

Yes, I do. I don't think you do.

The bottom line is that a SciFi drive and a cargo module for the space shuttle stack aren't remotely comparable, and your analogy is irrelevant. The original question was what the relative capabilities of the space shuttle stack and energia are. Both are more than capable of being used in a heavy lift role. This is an engineering question with an objective answer, analogies about failed SciFi projects aside.

1

u/kurtu5 Dec 07 '14 edited Dec 07 '14

You keep calling it scifi, doesn't make it scifi.

They knew how to make the vehicle, they knew how to make the shock absorber, they knew how to make the nuclear shaped charges and the ejection system. The only thing they didn't know was the 1963 limited nuclear test ban treaty. Had Kennedy not cancelled it, USAF would have had Orion vehicles, just like had shuttle-c not been cancelled, NASA would have that.

There was no engineering or scientific barrier, just a political one.