smaller proton variants

[insert_name]

It looks like ILS has decided to develop 2 stage of the proton to launch smaller payloads. they are going to use the breeze m as a second stage and remove the original second stage and expand the first. they also plan to make one with four engines instead of 6

http://spaceflightnow.com/2016/09/22/smaller-variants-of-russias-proton-rocket-on-the-market/

[DDE]

This is quite surprising, since there's a huge push to retire the whole toxic family. It may be an interim design until the nativized, Proton-sized Zenit derivative takes over.

[_Augustus_]

6 minutes ago, DDE said:

This is quite surprising, since there's a huge push to retire the whole toxic family. It may be an interim design until the nativized, Proton-sized Zenit derivative takes over.

Or Angara A5...

[Kryten]

9 minutes ago, DDE said:

This is quite surprising, since there's a huge push to retire the whole toxic family. It may be an interim design until the nativized, Proton-sized Zenit derivative takes over.

Yes, it's supposedly an interim vehicle until Fenix/Sunkar takes over in 2024 or '25. It would not at all surprise me if it ends up lasting longer, though.

[kerbiloid]

On 23.09.2016 at 3:23 PM, DDE said:

a huge push to retire the whole toxic family

The "toxic family" already has successfully outlasted several rocket families (including both Space Shuttle and Energy) and fortunately is going to keep this tradition.
Btw, every spaceship is powered with the same toxines, including fashionable Dragons.

 

Edited September 25, 2016 by kerbiloid

[DDE]

24 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

The "toxic family" already has successfully outlasted several rocket families (including both Space Shuttle and Energy) and fortunately is going to keep this tradition.
Btw, every spaceship is powered with the same toxines, including fashionable Dragons.

Yeah, but not in lower stages and in such quantities. This caused huge political pressure from Kazakhstan, even disregarding the series of crashes.

Visiting a crash site basically killed the previous head of Roscosmos.

[DerekL1963]

41 minutes ago, DDE said:

Yeah, but not in lower stages and in such quantities. This caused huge political pressure from Kazakhstan, even disregarding the series of crashes.

Indeed.  Kazakhstan is less than impressed with the amount of toxic waste the Soviets dumped, and the Russians continue to dump, on their territory.

[Diche Bach]

Don't know much about differences in rocket designs. I would've assumed they all pretty much use the same fuels and are thus about equally "toxic," is that not true? Are protons truly more toxic as a result of some components or fuel, or do they just crash and cause pollution more often?

[insert_name]

27 minutes ago, Diche Bach said:

Don't know much about differences in rocket designs. I would've assumed they all pretty much use the same fuels and are thus about equally "toxic," is that not true? Are protons truly more toxic as a result of some components or fuel, or do they just crash and cause pollution more often?

protons use UDMH and nitrogen tetroxide. extremely toxic

Soyuz, falcon 9, atlas 5 use kerosene and liquid oxygen, not really toxic

delta 4 uses liquid hydrogen and oxygen. you should know enough chemistry to know what result when 2 hydrogen molecules and one oxygen molecule react

not going to bother covering all the solid fuel types as well. those vary a lot too and can be somewhat toxic

[Diche Bach]

1 minute ago, insert_name said:

protons use UDMH and nitrogen tetroxide. extremely toxic

Soyuz, falcon 9, atlas 5 use kerosene and liquid oxygen, not really toxic

delta 4 uses liquid hydrogen and oxygen. you should know enough chemistry to know what result when 2 hydrogen molecules and one oxygen molecule react

not going to bother covering all the solid fuel types as well. those vary a lot too and can be somewhat toxic

Cool thanks!

So here is another question that reveals my naivete . . . where do they get "liquid hydrogen and oxygen?" Tell me they use water and just subject it to some fancy chemical processes and refrigeration!?

It cannot possibly be that simple eh? Otherwise, every power plant in the world would have switch to burn LHOX by now eh?! 

[insert_name]

5 minutes ago, Diche Bach said:

Cool thanks!

So here is another question that reveals my naivete . . . where do they get "liquid hydrogen and oxygen?" Tell me they use water and just subject it to some fancy chemical processes and refrigeration!?

It cannot possibly be that simple eh? Otherwise, every power plant in the world would have switch to burn LHOX by now eh?! 

most cryogenic fuels are made using a rapid decrease in pressure. as for why power plants don't burn hydrogen, hydrogen is extremely reactive and is therefore not found in large quantities in a pure form. the chemical reactions to separate hydrogen take more energy than the reactions used in burning would give.

[Diche Bach]

Ah wow . . . correct me if I'm wrong here, but  . . . isn't this basically saying that they get it as a by product of natural gas refining

[insert_name]

1 hour ago, Diche Bach said:

Ah wow . . . correct me if I'm wrong here, but  . . . isn't this basically saying that they get it as a by product of natural gas refining

I believe that is not refining as the natural gas gets destroyed in the process

[Diche Bach]

9 minutes ago, insert_name said:

I believe that is not refining as the natural gas gets destroyed in the process

Ah right. Yeah that wiki page actually says that and also what you just said above about it being more costly than valuable

Quote

Hydrogen is not an energy resource,^[105] except in the hypothetical context of commercial nuclear fusion power plants using deuterium or tritium, a technology presently far from development.^[106] The Sun's energy comes from nuclear fusion of hydrogen, but this process is difficult to achieve controllably on Earth.^[107] Elemental hydrogen from solar, biological, or electrical sources require more energy to make it than is obtained by burning it, so in these cases hydrogen functions as an energy carrier, like a battery. Hydrogen may be obtained from fossil sources (such as methane), but these sources are unsustainable.^[105]

The energy density per unit volume of both liquid hydrogen and compressed hydrogen gas at any practicable pressure is significantly less than that of traditional fuel sources, although the energy density per unit fuel mass is higher.^[105] Nevertheless, elemental hydrogen has been widely discussed in the context of energy, as a possible future carrier of energy on an economy-wide scale.^[108] For example, CO
2 sequestration followed by carbon capture and storage could be conducted at the point of H
2 production from fossil fuels.^[109] Hydrogen used in transportation would burn relatively cleanly, with some NO_xemissions,^[110] but without carbon emissions.^[109] However, the infrastructure costs associated with full conversion to a hydrogen economy would be substantial.^[111] Fuel cells can convert hydrogen and oxygen directly to electricity more efficiently than internal combustion engines.^[112]

So it has a high energy density per unit fuel mass, which makes it good for producing the very high energy needs of rocketry, but relatively worse energy density per unit volume.

[DDE]

So ultimately, @Diche Bach, hydrogen - like antimatter - is just a form of energy storage and is not available in pure form in any significant amount. At least at this point in our astrographic development.

And yeah, energy per volume is a huge problem that sometimes makes it a worse choice.

Edited September 26, 2016 by DDE

[kerbiloid]

Ariane family uses hyperholics (UH 25 or MMH  / NTO).
Ariane 2-4 - the whole rocket.
Ariane 5 - the second stage, but instead it burns solid motors with ammonia perchlorate. Though hydrazine burns into water steam, CO2 and nitrogen oxides, solids spread a cloud of chlorine compounds, heavier than air and forever toxic.

While hyperholics decay into ammonia in several days, killing the present grass, but then turning into an ammonia fertilizer, the kerosene spot stays kerosene spot until it will be removed.

Hyperholics mostly deflagrate, while LO2/kerosene detonate, they give weaker shockwave. That allowed to use ejecting seats in Gemini, boosted with hyperholic Titan.

LO2 is one of the strongest oxidisers and, afaik, caused more casualties during the rocket preparation (excluding 1960 tragedy, but when the second stage engine ignites inside a fuel tank of the first one, fuel doesn't matter).
LO2 leak can kill with freeze and cause spontaneous ignitions.

Hydrogen is clear when it's used, but its industrial production way is burning the natural gas (also don't forget all chemicals which it's own production requires) in a reactor, producing so-called hydrogen bearing gas which then must be separated in chemical absorbers. Just instead of poisoning one place, poisoning another.

Thousands of military rockets are fueled with hyperholics.

In 2006 after Dnepr (née Satan) fall, Kazakhstan set invoice for 1.1 mln USD. As usually the probability of launch succsess ~ 0.95, that means hundreds kilodollars per launch.
https://iq.hse.ru/news/177686730.html

[Kryten]

Most Ariane 5 flights use a hydrolox upper stage, the hypergolic one is now only intended to be used for Galileo launches.

[Diche Bach]

 

7 hours ago, DDE said:

So ultimately, @Diche Bach, hydrogen - like antimatter - is just a form of energy storage and is not available in pure form in any significant amount. At least at this point in our astrographic development.

And yeah, energy per volume is a huge problem that sometimes makes it a worse choice.

Well that just sucks doesn't it 

4 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

Ariane family uses hyperholics (UH 25 or MMH  / NTO).
Ariane 2-4 - the whole rocket.
Ariane 5 - the second stage, but instead it burns solid motors with ammonia perchlorate. Though hydrazine burns into water steam, CO2 and nitrogen oxides, solids spread a cloud of chlorine compounds, heavier than air and forever toxic.

While hyperholics decay into ammonia in several days, killing the present grass, but then turning into an ammonia fertilizer, the kerosene spot stays kerosene spot until it will be removed.

Hyperholics mostly deflagrate, while LO2/kerosene detonate, they give weaker shockwave. That allowed to use ejecting seats in Gemini, boosted with hyperholic Titan.

LO2 is one of the strongest oxidisers and, afaik, caused more casualties during the rocket preparation (excluding 1960 tragedy, but when the second stage engine ignites inside a fuel tank of the first one, fuel doesn't matter).
LO2 leak can kill with freeze and cause spontaneous ignitions.

Hydrogen is clear when it's used, but its industrial production way is burning the natural gas (also don't forget all chemicals which it's own production requires) in a reactor, producing so-called hydrogen bearing gas which then must be separated in chemical absorbers. Just instead of poisoning one place, poisoning another.

Thousands of military rockets are fueled with hyperholics.

In 2006 after Dnepr (née Satan) fall, Kazakhstan set invoice for 1.1 mln USD. As usually the probability of launch succsess ~ 0.95, that means hundreds kilodollars per launch.
https://iq.hse.ru/news/177686730.html

So what you are saying is, "choose your poison?"

[kerbiloid]

1 hour ago, Diche Bach said:

So what you are saying is, "choose your poison?"

Choose between potential poison at once and guaranteed poison on time.

[Kryten]

http://www.ilslaunch.com/newsroom/news-releases/ils-announces-two-missions-under-its-eutelsat-multi-launch-agreement-proton-b

ILS now have a contract for a Proton medium, pretty much ensuring that it will fly.

[p1t1o]

Heh, take a look at this:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinitrogen_tetroxide#The_Apollo-Soyuz_mishap

"On 24 July 1975, NTO poisoning affected the three U.S. astronauts on board the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project during its final descent. This was due to a switch negligently, or accidentally, left in the wrong position, which allowed NTO fumes to vent out of the Apollo spacecraft then back in through the cabin air intake from the outside air after the external vents were opened. One crew member lost consciousness during descent. Upon landing, the crew was hospitalized for 14 days for chemical-induced pneumonia and edema."

[DDE]

2 hours ago, p1t1o said:

"On 24 July 1975, NTO poisoning affected the three U.S. astronauts on board the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project during its final descent. This was due to a switch negligently, or accidentally, left in the wrong position, which allowed NTO fumes to vent out of the Apollo spacecraft then back in through the cabin air intake from the outside air after the external vents were opened. One crew member lost consciousness during descent. Upon landing, the crew was hospitalized for 14 days for chemical-induced pneumonia and edema."

And that's without the fuel and oxidizer teams getting set on fire in case of a handshake.

It's still better than the Inhibited Red Fuming Nitric Acid still used in Kh-22 cruise missiles.

 

[Kryten]

http://spacenews.com/ils-plans-larger-proton-payload-fairing-defers-work-on-smaller-proton-variant/

Work on Proton light has been deferred, and Proton medium is now a simpler version using stock Proton first and second stages; they only have to redesign the interstage and shift the control unit to the second stage.

[DDE]

@Kryten Predictable. It didn't exactly fit into the overall Russian launcher line-up.

[wumpus]

On 9/25/2016 at 2:59 PM, kerbiloid said:

The "toxic family" already has successfully outlasted several rocket families (including both Space Shuttle and Energy) and fortunately is going to keep this tradition.
Btw, every spaceship is powered with the same toxines, including fashionable Dragons.

The issue is "the dose makes the poison".  Dragons are a final stage that barely have any fuels, the Protons use in the first three stages (presumably anything using kerolox was inherited from another program.  Weird that they managed to reverse falcon/dragon).

But of course the definition of "rocket fuel" is something with vast amounts of thrust.  This invariably means practically explosive and often toxic.  While LO2 is *nasty* it will oxidize anything it can and will turn anything combustible into an explosive on contact it will also boil off rather quickly during a crash and simply go back to the atmosphere where it belongs.  Hydrogen is even less an issue and will boil faster (and presumably either become water vapor or completely leave the planet).  Kerosene might be pretty nasty, but it is sufficiently familiar to not cause a panic in the general population.

And as playing KSP will teach you: you can save a lot of energy if you can change your fuel into something with a lot more Isp.  This matters a lot with hydrogen and moreso if metastable solid hydrogen can be manufactured.  Even if it doesn't make sense to have the whole rocket use hydrolox, making the upper stages uses it makes your overall Isp nearly that of hydrogen (thanks to adding any stages above as "dead mass" in the rocket equation).