[AR] tether boost (was Re: Radian One spaceplane)
- From: Henry Spencer <hspencer@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: Arocket List <arocket@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 21 Jan 2022 18:39:03 -0500 (EST)
On Fri, 21 Jan 2022, Uwe Klein wrote:
Slightly OT: can one do a slingshot maneuver that imparts a final push
into orbit to the payload while taking that from impulse from the
"truck" and that leading into reentry. ( sone interesting ideas seen
with (longish )rope coupling )
One of the interesting things you can do with tethers is to deploy an RLV
payload out on a tether, and then cut the tether, giving the payload a
push higher while also deorbiting the RLV. Back in the 1990s, Ivan Bekey
at NASA did a study of this as a way to increase SSTO payload, and
concluded that a small, simple tether system could get 40% more payload to
the ISS orbit. (You could do it with an expendable upper stage too, but
that doesn't work nearly as well -- this is a case where a heavier vehicle
is *better*.)
However, you have to start out *in orbit*, because the tether deployment
probably takes hours, not minutes. He specifically looked at getting a
payload into orbit from an X-33 suborbital flight, and couldn't find a way
to do it: "twenty minutes is not enough".
(He gave a talk about it at one of the early Space Access conferences.)
Henry
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