Can the Soyuz Still go to the moon ?

[alpha tech]

If the Russians decided to restart development of the N1L3 could they go to the moon with the TMA or would they still have to use the one they originally developed

[Gaarst]

Of all the space programs to restart, the N1-L3 is probably the last one on the list. I can't imagine a single reason that would motivate anyone to dig this thing up.

Anyway no. The 7K-L3 was designed for a lunar mission, all the other Soyuz were designed for LEO missions, you'd need a new design.

 

Edit: the TMA is not used anymore, Roscosmos is using the updated MS for its ISS flights.

Edited February 28, 2017 by Gaarst

[DerekL1963]

8 minutes ago, alpha tech said:

If the Russians decided to restart development of the N1L3 could they go to the moon with the TMA

No.   Over the decades Soyuz has been pretty well optimized for used as an LEO taxi.

[alpha tech]

new design as  in retrofitting the old service module and orbital module and possible upgrades

[Nibb31]

1 hour ago, alpha tech said:

new design as  in retrofitting the old service module and orbital module and possible upgrades

Since those old bits no longer exist, yes, it would be a new design.

[wumpus]

If the Russians wanted to go to the Moon, I'd assume they would build the lunar rocket in space like a space station (they certainly have the experience).  The economies of scale might work better with a big rocket, but I'd suspect that simple assembly would go a long way and require much more limited R&D spending.

This really wasn't an option in the 1960s and early 70s, but I suspect with modern skills it would make more sense than an N-1.  Pretty much anything makes more sense than an N-1, although if you could find a way to testfire it, that would let you at least start to make a N-1 work [the thing had to be fully launched to do *any* testing].

[kerbiloid]

Even if, why N-1? It has zero success history, while Energy has 2 successful flights.
Also Energy has been developed by the bureau which consumed the N-1 developers. Even if they would restore old projects, unlikely they would choose N-1 instead of their own Energy.

Edited March 1, 2017 by kerbiloid

[tater]

Weren't they working on a next generation vehicle that was a conical capsule? What ever happened to that?

[p1t1o]

The N1 was a failure.

The F14 is never coming back.

The Sr-71 cannot be turned into a cut-price SSTO.

But rest assured, if Russia, or anyone else wanted to go to the moon, it could be done. Its not that we dont go back to the Moon because we dont have a vehicle - we dont have a vehicle because there isn't enough reason to go back. "Because its hard" doesn't cut it anymore.

[Nibb31]

46 minutes ago, tater said:

Weren't they working on a next generation vehicle that was a conical capsule? What ever happened to that?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federation_(spacecraft)

http://www.russianspaceweb.com/acts.html

Edited March 1, 2017 by Nibb31

[Combatsmithen]

1 hour ago, p1t1o said:

The N1 was a failure.

The F14 is never coming back.

The Sr-71 cannot be turned into a cut-price SSTO.

But rest assured, if Russia, or anyone else wanted to go to the moon, it could be done. Its not that we dont go back to the Moon because we dont have a vehicle - we dont have a vehicle because there isn't enough reason to go back. "Because its hard" doesn't cut it anymore.

 

RIP F-14

[p1t1o]

6 minutes ago, Combatsmithen said:

RIP F-14

 

[Combatsmithen]

1 hour ago, p1t1o said:

 

 

Not signed in

 

Not signed in

Never forget

 

Edited March 1, 2017 by Combatsmithen

[YNM]

They already planned another spacecraft for that. Calling N1 again... disastrous ?

[magnemoe]

22 hours ago, Nibb31 said:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federation_(spacecraft)

http://www.russianspaceweb.com/acts.html

Kind of boring, an mix of orion and dragon1 by the look of it. 
Soyuz is an unique design. 

[kerbiloid]

7 minutes ago, magnemoe said:

Kind of boring, an mix of orion and dragon1 by the look of it. 

No, it is to land on chute+rockets and legs. Rocket nozzles presumed to null the horizontal speed too. Like regular soft landing engines, but more advanced.

8 minutes ago, magnemoe said:

Soyuz is an unique design. 

A dull classics compared to TKS.

Edited March 2, 2017 by kerbiloid

[_Augustus_]

39 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

No, it is to land on chute+rockets and legs. Rocket nozzles presumed to null the horizontal speed too. Like regular soft landing engines, but more advanced.

A dull classics compared to TKS.

TKS should've replaced Soyuz.......

[wumpus]

On 3/1/2017 at 9:01 AM, p1t1o said:

The N1 was a failure.

The F14 is never coming back.

The Sr-71 cannot be turned into a cut-price SSTO.

But rest assured, if Russia, or anyone else wanted to go to the moon, it could be done. Its not that we dont go back to the Moon because we dont have a vehicle - we dont have a vehicle because there isn't enough reason to go back. "Because its hard" doesn't cut it anymore.

I think the X-15 would make more sense as a cut-price SSTO (or more likely two manned stages where the "launcher stage" would stage from the "final stage" beyond the atmosphere.  Staging in the atmosphere doomed at least one SR-71 attempting to launch a rocket/drone).  While not only is this "reinventing the Falcon 9",  the final parts would be unlikely to reuse *any* parts, nor much engineering.  Many early iterations of the shuttle looked like this, but the final specifications drove the eventual shuttle design.

Two huge problems would that while the X-15 could handle extreme speed, it never had to deal with full-on orbital re-entry.  There's little reason to believe it could survive that.  The other issue is that it was insufficiently cryogenic and the B-52 had to pump at least a full fuel tank of hydrogen into its tank* over the course of the mission.  Finally, a "scaled up to orbital" X-15 would be huge, probably needing the Stratolauncher to fly (assuming it didn't lift off a pad or take off on a runway).

* not sure how much hydrogen was vented directly from the B-52, but the effect would be the same.

[Ten Key]

The X-15 used alcohol and LOX for early testing, and then switched to ammonia and LOX later on. It never ran on hydrogen.

[p1t1o]

21 minutes ago, wumpus said:

Two huge problems

Its not clear if you mean re-vamping old X-15 airframes to make cut-price SSTOs or designing a bona-fide SSTO merely based on the X-15 (which wouldn't exactly be "cut price").

Because if re-vamping old airframes, the fist huge problem is that it is a half-century-old design which if used, would be ignoring a vast amount of improved aerospace knowledge in propulsion, hypersonics, *safety* etc etc. Not to mention that its payload capacity was pilot+zero.

The X-15 was experimental and thus by definition, designed with a lack of knowledge.

I dont want to say that nostalgia is anathema to aerospace, because we all cherish our nostalgia for our favorite craft, but I'd say that it has very little place in the field of aerospace design.

 

Edited March 2, 2017 by p1t1o

[DDE]

How'd we drift to SSTOs?

Basically, the Soyuz would require a major overhaul. Luckily, if you're content with an L1-type flyby, you can fit the requisite craft onto a Proton. See the later Zond missions.

[kerbiloid]

1 hour ago, wumpus said:

I think the X-15 would make more sense as a cut-price SSTO

X-15B  was to be spaceplane, but required 3-stage booster. Not really SSTO.

 

[wumpus]

1 hour ago, p1t1o said:

Its not clear if you mean re-vamping old X-15 airframes to make cut-price SSTOs or designing a bona-fide SSTO merely based on the X-15 (which wouldn't exactly be "cut price").

Because if re-vamping old airframes, the fist huge problem is that it is a half-century-old design which if used, would be ignoring a vast amount of improved aerospace knowledge in propulsion, hypersonics, *safety* etc etc. Not to mention that its payload capacity was pilot+zero.

The X-15 was experimental and thus by definition, designed with a lack of knowledge.

I dont want to say that nostalgia is anathema to aerospace, because we all cherish our nostalgia for our favorite craft, but I'd say that it has very little place in the field of aerospace design.

 

I wasn't serious about this suggestion (and have to look up what I was thinking about hydrogen.  Something needed a ton of hydrogen replaced in flight, but it certainly wasn't the X-15).  The point was that resurrecting dead tech just isn't going to happen: if it wasn't up to the job then, starting from modern assumptions usually will work better:

SR-17 - can't be upgraded.  Actually I doubt any real parts of the SR-71 have been manufacturable since the 1960s, but bear with me.  The Blackbird had issues separating any launched craft, and doing such in the atmosphere has been abandoned.  Also while my rule of thumb is that each "3 machs" cut your fuel budget in half (I think it was based on space shuttle delta-v budgets), there certainly isn't room for the rest  of the ~20k delta-v.

F-14 is dead.  So is the Sopwith Camel.  I'm more surprised that the F-16 hasn't been put back in production (if all you want is a missile launcher...).

The N-1 is a failure.  You would need to test the N-1 on a stand.  You would also have to have the motivation to go back to the N-1. The most likely to build an N-1 has the motivation to resurrect Engergia (although I suspect they haven't the money for that).

[kerbiloid]

2 minutes ago, wumpus said:

 Something needed a ton of hydrogen replaced in flight

They were going to test a hypersonic (6 Mach) refueling between a pair of X-15, but then cancelled.

4 minutes ago, wumpus said:

 The point was that resurrecting dead tech just isn't going to happen

He-he, Pegasus used X-15 data when was being developed.

[monophonic]

3 hours ago, wumpus said:

I'm more surprised that the F-16 hasn't been put back in production (if all you want is a missile launcher...).

They cannot do that. They would have to stop the production line first. It has been going since 1976 and orders still keep coming.

Granted the design has been modernized many times over. It is a real export success. As to why USAF has not ordered any new airframes in a long time, well... forum rules forbid discussing politics.