HOTOL was a 1980’s/90’s British Aerospace idea for an airbreathing SSTO spaceplane. As with all such designs to date, it came equipped with a heavy load of optimism; physics, however, does not care about your sunny worldview, and like all other airbreathing SSTOs to date, the design simply could not be made to work with existing materials, propulsion systems, politics and economics.
Just bought on ebay, a print of the Boeing “Space Sortie” vehicle.
So much for my “maybe I should spend less in these difficult times” idea. If you would like to help fund the acquisition and preservation of such things, along with getting high quality scans for yourself, please consider signing on either for the APR Patreon or the APR Monthly Historical Documents Program. Back issues are available for purchase by patrons and subscribers.
I’ve just made the March 2022 rewards available for APR Patrons and Subscribers. This latest package includes:
Art: A poster of the 1990’s German Sanger II two-stage-to-orbit spaceplane
Document: Bell-Boeing “Pointer” brochure… full color brochure describing the proposed tiltrotor UAV
Document: Cessna EV-37E STOL: 1964 presentation on battlefield recon/surveillance version of the T-37
Document: History of the Juno Cluster System: conference paper on the early satellite launching system
CAD diagram: work-in-progress layout of the Aerocon Wingship. General arrangement diagram with brief description of how much trouble I have to go through sometimes…
If you would like to help fund the acquisition and preservation of such things, along with getting high quality scans for yourself, please consider signing on either for the APR Patreon or the APR Monthly Historical Documents Program. Back issues are available for purchase by patrons and subscribers.
In March of 1961, “Space World” magazine published a few articles about what the future would look like thanks to the onrushing new technologies of the space age. It is… well, it’s wrong.
The article is jam-packed with predictions of a glorious technological and economic future to be brought about by the Space Age. And from the standpoint of 1961, it probably made sense: technology was advancing by leaps and bounds, the budget for NASA was beginning to explode, overall space and related science spending by both government and industry were shooting upwards. It *should* have been a glorious new age. But the experts did not count on a few things. Viet Nam, for example and, worse, LBJs “Great Society” economic and social suppression/dystopia promotion programs.
Some of the predictions for 1971:
1) The “Space Industry” would be the biggest industry in America
2) The “middle class” would be working high-paying skilled jobs and would make up 80% of the population
3) Skyscrapers would dwarf the Empire State Building, using girders made from beryllium, tantalum and niobium
4) Tape recorders would be the size of a cigarette
5) You could easily send a fax from, say, New York to Australia. You’d scan the page, beam it up to a satellite passing overhead, the satellite would store the scan and, when it some time later passed over Australia, the fax would be beamed down. That’s… not how international satellite communications works, but OK.
6) There’d be cities in Antarctica
7) There’d be regular, routine and affordable suborbital rocket passenger transport. Such as from Antarctica to New York, several flights a day.
Amusingly, these predictions are considered likely to be too conservative; people would look back to the predictions and “wonder why the prophets of 1961 were so shortsighted.”
They could not have known that their glorious future would only last a small handful of years. By 1968, the Apollo program was already terminated, with no follow-on. And the maximum spending for NASA occurred only in 65-66 or so, peaking at about 4% of the federal budget. Imagine if the upward trend had continued to, say, 1970. Perhaps 6, maybe 8% of the federal budget. What a world it could have been.
Awww. I gave myself a sad.
Sigh.
The full-rez scan of the article has been uploaded to the 2022-02 APR Extras folder on Dropbox. This is available to all $4 and up Patrons and Subscribers. If you would like to help fund the acquisition and preservation of such things, along with getting high quality scans for yourself, please consider signing on either for the APR Patreon or the APR Monthly Historical Documents Program.
The “holy grail” in this case is an SSTO spaceplane. It is to *not* incorporate airbreathing or wacky unproven technologies; instead, it is to use fairly conventional liquid propellant rocket engines in the tail of a cranked-delta spaceplane. To lob it off the ground, it will use a powered sled for a horizontal runway launch.
Ehh.
Same basic concept as the Sanger Silverbird of 1944 vintage, or the Boeing “Windjammer” and RASV concepts from the 70’s. If they can get the mass ratio to work… sure, it’s possible. They’re claiming a 48-hour turnaround. Uh-huh. I’ll believe it when I see it. I wish them the best, but I’ve seen far too many such press releases since the 90’s to get all excited.
A few patent applications that might be of interest:
“Earth to Orbit Transportation System”
“Rocket propulsion systems and associated methods”
The not terribly enlightening website is here:
https://www.radianaerospace.com/
Curiously, one of the names attached to both patent applications that might be of interest to readers of this blog is Gary Hudson, of the Phoenix SSTO, Air Launch and Roton fame. But he doesn’t seem to be listed on the website.
More photos needed.
Four years after first unveiling its hypersonic airliner concept at #AIAASciTech 2018 @Boeing has revealed a refined, more realistic Mach 5 reusable air-breathing design targeting military and space launch roles at @aiaa San Diego event pic.twitter.com/CtpxA5OJGn
— Guy Norris (@AvWeekGuy) January 4, 2022
All I have is this single page. This would be from the 1980’s, probably before or concurrent with the X-30 NASP program. The range of possibilities for hypersonic cruise airbreathing vehicles is pretty remarkable.
The rewards for November, 2021, have been sent out. Patrons should have received a notification message through Patreon linking to the rewards; subscribers should have received a notification from Dropbox linking to the rewards. If you did not, let me know.
Document: “Galactic-Jupiter Probe Program Concept:” 1967 NASA-Goddard brochure describing a Pioneer/Voyager type of space probe
Document: “Mixed Mode Rocket Vehicles for International Space Transportation Systems,” 1973 paper describing modified Shuttles and other launch vehicles
Document: “Nuclear Physics Made Very, Very Easy,”1968 NASA NERVA test operation publication that summarizes nuclear physics
Diagram: Navalized Advanced tactical Fighter (Northrop NF-23) general arrangement
CAD Diagram ($5 and up): “Disney Bomb,” British designed and built, American dropped rocket-boosted submarine pen penetrating bomb from the end of WWII
If this sort of thing is of interest, sign up either for the APR Patreon or the APR Monthly Historical Documents Program. *ALL* back issues, one a month since 2014, are available for subscribers at low cost.
Here are some screenshots snagged from a not-quite-final version of the book, showing the sort of content you can expect from the final product.
As before it is available for pre-order from both the publisher and from Amazon:
The June 1986 issue of “Air Force Magazine” had a cover article about the next big thing for the Air Force… aerospaceplanes capable of attaining orbit. Those who have been paying attention since 1986 might have noticed a dearth of aerospaceplanes, but at least the article has some spiffy cover art, along with interior art of what it claims is a 1965 McDonnell Douglas aerospaceplane. Two problems, though… McDonnell Douglass didn’t exist until 1967, and the art sure looks more like an SST to me. Shrug.
Anyway, I’ve uploaded a 300DPI scan of the article (and two ads… one depicting what appears to be a neutral particle beam space weapon, the other for a series of space-based nuclear powerplants) to the 2021-06 APR Extras folder on Dropbox, available to all APR patrons and subscribers.
