X-37B

[SunlitZelkova]

13 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

As history clearly shows, any treaties are concluded just to not bother each other for nothing, when the parties are interested in the same, and agree to not disturb each other on subjects treated as currently impossible or commonly undesirable to the moment. When there appears a necessity or a possibility, the treaties quickly get obsolete and annoying, and they conclude another treaty based on the status-quo.

The same is about this one.

The X-37B had its first flight literally in the same month and year New START was signed (April 2010).

Having read much about the contrasting policies of the Johnson and Nixon administrations in the 60s, I can tell you for sure that the US did not play some sort of 32D chess move to push nuclear arms control to the brink, over several administrations. Our government is not that smart.

Edited December 6, 2022 by Gargamel
Portions Redacted by Moderator

[Gargamel]

A number of posts have been edited or removed.   If you don't agree with a statement, please don't resort to name calling.  People have their own opinions, and by a variety of circumstances, those opinions may differ from yours.   Address those opinions with facts, figures, and references.   We also don't need people making arguments that have already been repeatedly made just to get the last word in.   Debate and discourse is good and healthy, arguing for the sake of it is not. 

[grawl]

On 12/6/2022 at 5:34 AM, kerbiloid said:

Obviously, I even had listed them, lol.

  Reveal hidden contents

• delta-phase plutonium-239-gallium alloy (inner sparkplug layer)
  + its plutonium-240/241 and americium parasite impurities
• uranium-233 deuteride (outer sparkplug layer)
  + its uranium-232 parasite impurities
• highly-enriched uranium-235 (tamper/pusher)
• reactor-grade uranium-238/235 (radiation case liner)
• deuterized polyethylene (sparkplug laying and shock barrier)
• metal tritide-deuteride (DT-boosting and neutron tube)
• cesium (neutron source, maybe)
• germanium-impregnated FOGBANK plastic/"aerogel" (radiation channel filler)
• beryllium (pusher/reflector)
• lithium-6 deuteride (fusion fuel, but probably already tested before, cuz just salt)
• tungsten, titanium, stainless steel - in assortment, just as a part of the assembly in whole
• carbon fiber, silicon carbide (cuz spysat film capsules didn't need it for heatshield)
• hafnium carbide, tantalum carbide (as an improvement of the previous item)
• nickel, copper, gold, rhenium (liners, plutonium insulation, tamper admixture)
• PBX-blah-blah-digits super-fine safe explosive (implosive sphere and initiation layer)

Probably, missed something.

Two layered balls of materials, primary and secondary, inside a layered material case, that's it.

 

The keyword is "many". You can't test many things in a 227 kg bay used seven times last twelve years. You can test only the My Precious one.

For everything other there is the ISS.

 

So, we do agree ! I missed your post a few pages back.

Army spacecraft is doing army stuff. Not quite the surprise.

 

 

 

I don't get the numerous posts over this question. What's the issue with this interpretation ?

[SunlitZelkova]

14 minutes ago, grawl said:

 

So, we do agree ! I missed your post a few pages back.

Army spacecraft is doing army stuff. Not quite the surprise.

 

 

 

I don't get the numerous posts over this question. What's the issue with this interpretation ?

I’m not sure if you are missing what he is alluding to or not, but to spell it out plainly he is stating that the X-37B is being used to test the longevity of nuclear weapons in space, with an eye towards evolving the X-37B into a full fledged orbital bombardment system.

[grawl]

35 minutes ago, SunlitZelkova said:

I’m not sure if you are missing what he is alluding to or not, but to spell it out plainly he is stating that the X-37B is being used to test the longevity of nuclear weapons in space, with an eye towards evolving the X-37B into a full fledged orbital bombardment system.

Did I stutter ?

 

...

...

 

Sry, I always dreamed to say this one 

 

More seriously. Yes, I understand his statements, and I do fail to understand why would they be considered absurd.

As I wrote, army doing army stuff. That's their job after all. 

I don't think it's its sole property though. Could have been used once to test nuclear materials, another to try out some lasers, another for new fuel cell type, or whatever classified stuff you might think of. Or even all together for the same trip. Maybe just to test the craft itself as well.

 

I'd be more doubtful about the orbital bombarment system way. But if the Pentagon decides to build a new, bigger spacecraft, it will have a lot in common with the X37, as much as will benefit from its R&D. And if they want it multi-role, it will be able to use an array of conventional and non-conventional weapons. @kerbiloid prediction might not be far off the bat in this case.

 

Edited December 7, 2022 by grawl

[darthgently]

1 hour ago, grawl said:

Did I stutter ?

 

...

...

 

Sry, I always dreamed to say this one 

 

More seriously. Yes, I understand his statements, and I do fail to understand why would they be considered absurd.

As I wrote, army doing army stuff. That's their job after all. 

I don't think it's its sole property though. Could have been used once to test nuclear materials, another to try out some lasers, another for new fuel cell type, or whatever classified stuff you might think of. Or even all together for the same trip. Maybe just to test the craft itself as well.

 

I'd be more doubtful about the orbital bombarment system way. But if the Pentagon decides to build a new, bigger spacecraft, it will have a lot in common with the X37, as much as will benefit from its R&D. And if they want it multi-role, it will be able to use an array of conventional and non-conventional weapons. @kerbiloid prediction might not be far off the bat in this case.

 

It would be in violation of a treaty that no nation has violated that we know of and that the US has been a stickler to to date, that we know of.  I know DC is getting whacky, but I seriously doubt that whacky 

[SunlitZelkova]

2 hours ago, grawl said:

Yes, I understand his statements, and I do fail to understand why would they be considered absurd.

It is not just that idea alone, he is claiming that the idea that the X-37B is a nuclear weapons platform is more plausible than the explanation that the X-37B is being used for spacecraft materials/equipment tests for future intelligence gathering satellites, and that said known fact that the X-37B is used for spacecraft materials/equipment tests somehow does not make sense and is implausible.

[kerbiloid]

5 hours ago, grawl said:

I don't think it's its sole property though. Could have been used once to test nuclear materials, another to try out some lasers, another for new fuel cell type, or whatever classified stuff you might think of

No need in space plane to test a fuel-cell battery, no need to return it back. Any satellite could do that, or the ISS. Also, 1 t of fuel cells per decade looks too puny for a space program.

Space lasers also can pe placed on a sat. And a 227 kg laser looks too lightweight, compared to the typical estimations and known prototypes which usually were from several to tens of tonnes.

In case of warhead, you have to return it back to saw and see, and to not leave it in orbit (where it can be explored), and to return it right to the military base.
Preferrably you should use a maneuverable craft to evade from others' inspector satellites while it's flying.
So, a mini-spaceplane matches these needs perfectly, and so it looks that they are married to each other in sense of purpose and sense. Any other payload is too meaningless for such  spaceplane program, any other spacecraft looks poorly appropriate for such payload. But together they make sense, and the increasing in steps flight durations look very close to what they need to test both orbital warhead and orbital warhead platform.

Thus, it's with no doubt a test of the orbital craft itself. But there is no purpose for a spaceplane staying in orbit for years, except when it's used as a long-term platform for something what should be secretly kept in orbit and then secretly returned to the Earth. 
The planned X-37B with (wiki) 1+ t payload could be a laser platform as well. But  its payload is several times greater than X-37B's, so can't be tested on it. Rather than that, a single warhead  tested on X-37B is what a bomber version of X-37C could carry.

(I don't state that the plan will ever go farther than the tests, as most of known space plans usually fruit into something pathetic compared to the original idea.)

2 hours ago, SunlitZelkova said:

he is claiming that the idea that the X-37B is a nuclear weapons platform

Not X-37B but its planned ancestor, X-37C.
X-37B is a test platform.

Edited December 8, 2022 by kerbiloid

[SunlitZelkova]

15 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

Not X-37B but its planned ancestor, X-37C.
X-37B is a test platform.

Actually it would be X-37D, X-37C is a proposed crew variant.

http://www.spacesafetymagazine.com/aerospace-engineering/spacecraft-design/boeing-x-37c/

[grawl]

Overall, the only solid thing we know about is that we don't know what is aboard, as it's calssified. We can only speculate.

As usual, some speculate wildly, others speculate in a more conservative fashion. The synthesis of these speculations is probably closer to the truth.

 

Anyway, we'll know about it in, what, 50 years ? I don't remember the time needed for de-classifying stuff in the US. Time to take our pills, to last that long. 

Actually let's hope we won't discover it sooner, as it would mean some of the secret stuff has been used in a conflict.

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

1 hour ago, grawl said:

The synthesis of these speculations is probably closer to the truth

I wouldn't tilt the scale quite so much.

[kerbiloid]

8 hours ago, SunlitZelkova said:

Actually it would be X-37D, X-37C is a proposed crew variant.

http://www.spacesafetymagazine.com/aerospace-engineering/spacecraft-design/boeing-x-37c/

Quote

A scaled up version of the vehicle, the X-37C, would be able to carry crew and larger payloads, both pressurized and unpressurized. Launched on top of an Atlas Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle, the crew carrying version of the X-37C would carry a pressurized compartment in the payload bay of the spacecraft, equipped with a hatch to provide crew ingress and egress.

Spoiler

 

So, it is a reincarnation of DynaSoar, which had a bomber option by default.

 

  

6 hours ago, grawl said:

Anyway, we'll know about it in, what, 50 years ?

As the modern RV shells look being enough perfect, so the obvious coming direction of their progress is low-altitude SLBM trajectory for the Prompt Global Strike.

And as we can read in wiki, W93 and Mark 7 are purposed exactly for SLBM.

So, the Mark 7 probably uses same technologies as the HTV-2 hypersonic demonstrator and its friends.

As the now-modern RV are enough heatproof to survive the deorbit from LEO, Mark 7 will be probably appropriate to reenter at 11 km/s as well, i.e. return from HEO.

If so, it makes the Mark 7 + W93 assembly be the ammo for a hypothetical HEO launch platform.

If take the LOP-G modules as a base (especially the low-thrust long-term energetical module), it makes LOP-G a perfect base for such HEO missile platform.

Also we can see the rather strange dances with Orion (a decade ago they launched something, then an eight-year long pause, then a year of attempts to launch, and now the launch.)
While the lunar capabilities of Orion and SLS were doubted on this forum many times, as they are really weak.

But the strange  perseverance in funding it (and strange jumps between the different lunar base projects), and as well in funding CST-100 (which doesn't have an aim after the ISS deorbit and Crew Dragon flights), makes to think that not the silliest persons who do this see their purpose enough clear just delayed.
Of course, their purpose can't be just in delivering tourists for the hypothetical Axiom, Bigelow, or other such things. Crew Dragon is enough for these adult toys.

Any LEO and HEO platform would need servicing and support (like Hubble was serviced by Shuttle).
So, CST and Orion look perfect support crew ships for LEO and HEO platforms respectively.

If so, we'll see orbital missile infrastructure being developed by 2040.

Edited December 9, 2022 by kerbiloid

[SunlitZelkova]

1 hour ago, kerbiloid said:

So, it is a reincarnation of DynaSoar, which had a bomber option by default.

I thought it was supposed to remain on orbit indefinitely…

[kerbiloid]

16 minutes ago, SunlitZelkova said:

I thought it was supposed to remain on orbit indefinitely…

Dyno had various options, this one probably too.

[TheFlyingKerman]

On 12/5/2022 at 4:36 PM, kerbiloid said:

Why need a whole spaceplane system to deliver almost nothing, when any regular cargo craft would even not see a difference?

The space shuttle was widely considered an operational failure because it was huge and therefore extreme expensive to operate. For its successor it makes sense to scale back the size. Besides the new spaceplane had to fit regular sized lifters. As it is, the design serves well as an orbital lab and test platform for reusable spacecrafts.

[kerbiloid]

2 hours ago, TheFlyingKerman said:

As it is, the design serves well as an orbital lab and test platform for reusable spacecrafts.

The Space Shuttle payload was 15 t. And it had flown 135 times in 25 years,

X-37B has flown 7 times in 12 years with 0.227 t  max onboard.

 

15 * 135 / 25 = 81 t/y vs 0.227 * 7 /12 = 0.13 t/y

[razark]

5 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

The Space Shuttle payload was 15 t. And it had flown 135 times in 25 years,

X-37B has flown 7 times in 12 years with 0.227 t  max onboard.

 

15 * 135 / 25 = 81 t/y vs 0.227 * 7 /12 = 0.13 t/y

The point of the X-37B isn't how many launches or payload per year. 

It's the 3770 days spent on missions, compared to 1330 days for shuttle. 

 

1330 / 25 = 53.2 d/y vs. 3770 / 12 = 314.166 days per year

[kerbiloid]

21 minutes ago, razark said:

The point of the X-37B isn't how many launches or payload per year. 

It's the 3770 days spent on missions, compared to 1330 days for shuttle. 

There is no reason for spaceplane to stay in orbit for years.

Actually, it's money spent on nothing, because the wings and the fins and the complicated heat protection don't work in orbit, but degrade.
The  spaceplane should taxi as often as possible or stay in hangar.

Unless it's used to keep in orbit something described several times above.

[Codraroll]

5 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

There is no reason for spaceplane to stay in orbit for years.

Yes there is, as you have repeatedly been told. Why don't these simple facts sink in?

Edited December 10, 2022 by Codraroll

[razark]

5 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

Actually, it's money spent on nothing, because the wings and the fins and the complicated heat protection don't work in orbit, but degrade.

My car has an engine, which doesn't make any sense.  Since my car sits in a parking space 95% of the time, it shouldn't have an engine that it's not using.

Makes more sense that I should just get a new engine every time I need to drive, and throw it away when I'm done.

 

Unless I am using my car to transport a large beagle, which is the only thing it could be used for, since a beagle is one of the many things that will fit in my car and might need to be transported.

[Brotoro]

It doesn't strike me as mysterious why the X-37B is on long missions.

It was originally a reusable spaceplane tested at NASA. Then the design was given to the Air Force as a research tool. Once the Air Force has a toy with interesting capabilities, they aren't going want to give it up. What, it only has a small payload capacity compared to other options (such as Dragon) that were developed later? Ah, but look what the X-37B can do: Very long duration missions! I bet your Dragon was built for that. So, they send an X-37B up on longer and longer missions to justify keeping them, at the cost of a launch vehicle every couple years.

Whatever research they are doing can't be vital, or they would have several of them running in parallel (you don't want to wait two years to get your vital data only to have it lost in a reentry accident...you'd have more doing the research as backup).

[kerbiloid]

6 hours ago, Codraroll said:

Yes there is, as you have repeatedly been told. Why don't these simple facts sink in?

I have repeatedly miss this "there is"? What exactly purpose except listed by me?

6 hours ago, razark said:

My car has an engine, which doesn't make any sense.  Since my car sits in a parking space 95% of the time, it shouldn't have an engine that it's not using.

You car needs it to move. A satellite doesn't, so usually sats don't have boosters, only the attitude control.

Usually (always) the sats don't have a heatshield. Because they don't land. 
Whell, the Vostok-based ones do, and early Yantar did.
But since the early Coronas the US sats did never care of returning a 200 kg heavy tool, as it didn't make much sense.

Especially, they never have the heavy wings and fins with overexpensive tiled heat protection.
Because it's heavy itself and makes the rocket payload much heavier.

Wings, fins, lifting body shape are the last and the worst things in space, after parachutes and floaters.
Also, making the craft much heavier they make it spend fuel on attitude control.

The tiles are fragile, and they suffer from the space conditions. Fast temperature changes, micrometeoroids (mostly microsatelloids), UV, etc.
By leaving the craft in space for years you just make it degrade by orders of magnitude faster than if it stayed in a comfortable hangar.
The crystal tale of Space Shuttle, flying like a regular plane, was broken against the wall of reality, making it be the most expensive cargo delivery system in history.

The wings in space are needed only when you have no other way to solve the problem.

Do you leave your Lamborghini just in street for years or put it in garage?
The rain/sun/frost/whatever you have at your place are like the space weather. And micrometeoroids are space hooligans writing on it with a nail or breaking the glass.
You should minimize all these factors and don't leave your car in the street more than required. The same about space wings.

Also, if you use your car just 5% of time, it means that you should better go by bus or use car sharing, and thus decrease your carbon footprint and oil consumption.
By the way, it applies to everyone.

4 hours ago, Brotoro said:

It was originally a reusable spaceplane tested at NASA.

It would be just so if there was not 100 t heavy Shuttle just before.

Also, NASA doesn't test anything, it just distributes governmental money between contractors and their R&D, sometimes ordered by NASA.

So, why would NASA want a mini-spaceplane with near-zero capability? Just to test a spaceplane? This was already done by Shuttle.

4 hours ago, Brotoro said:

Ah, but look what the X-37B can do: Very long duration missions!

I see. What for? At least any sense in long spaceplane missions when any spaceplane is just a near-atmosphere taxi. The sooner it returns, the less it additionally speands on dead mass carrying.

5 hours ago, Brotoro said:

What, it only has a small payload capacity compared to other options (such as Dragon) that were developed later?

What can a 200 kg payload should need a whole dedicated spaceplane to be returned?

And why test it for 12 years, so a already half of the total Shuttle lifetime?

Two-three more flights, and X-37B will be flying as long as the Shuttles had done, but without any purpose.

[razark]

11 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

You car needs it to move. A satellite doesn't, so usually sats don't have boosters, only the attitude control.

Oh, I see what the problem is.  You're thinking the X-37B is a satellite!  It's not, it's actually a space plane, so it kind of needs the wings and stuff do do it's job.

As for how bad it is for the space plane to be in space, it's been there for three times as long as shuttle was, and it ain't broke yet.  So...  I guess somebody knows what they're doing with the thing?

 

17 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

The wings in space are needed only when you have no other way to solve the problem.

Like returning the payload and vehicle from orbit?  What's the other solution to that?

 

20 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

And why test it for 12 years, so a already half of the total Shuttle lifetime?

They haven't been testing it, they've been using it.

[kerbiloid]

14 minutes ago, razark said:

Oh, I see what the problem is.  You're thinking the X-37B is a satellite!  It's not, it's actually a space plane, so it kind of needs the wings and stuff do do it's job.

It is a satellite (spending years in orbit) implemented as a spaceplane (i.e taxi).

First of all, it is expensive and useless. You could put a tonne or two of equipment more instead of the wings.

15 minutes ago, razark said:

As for how bad it is for the space plane to be in space,

https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2014/09/iss-evaluate-mmod-strike-cupola-window/

25 minutes ago, razark said:

Like returning the payload and vehicle from orbit?  What's the other solution to that?

What have they used everything other than X-37B and its 1 t total?

[SunlitZelkova]

2 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

First of all, it is expensive and useless. You could put a tonne or two of equipment more instead of the wings.

This is more or less the same logic used by the Soviets when they deduced that the Space Shuttle was a nuclear strike platform, and yet the Space Shuttle was not a nuclear strike platform, despite expendable rockets and cheap Spacelab derived, Salyut style stations being more useful for the type of science they wanted to do.

As I said, our government is not that smart. They don’t play 4D chess moves on their adversaries by beginning development of a space nuclear strike system while simultaneously signing nuclear arms reduction treaties, they do things like saying they want to use Shuttle components to speed up the development of an SLHV, only for a much more economical SHLV to pop up by the time the government Shuttle derived one is ready.

To put into perspective why we are so opposed to your theory, it is as though we said there are no reasons why Oryol and ROSS have been pushed so far into the future, and therefore Russia must have no intention to actually build Oryol and ROSS and therefore all plans and announcements related to it are lies.

It is rather obvious the future Russian crewed space projects have issues and therefore suffer delays, and it is unthinkable that Russia would give up its piloted spaceflight capability and therefore announcements about ROSS and Oryol are not lies (at least not all of them). Likewise, placing materials and equipment in space and studying how they fare over a period of multiple years is a perfectly sound explanation from the USAF as to what the X-37B does, and it is unthinkable that the US would abandon the Outer Space Treaty, and therefore the X-37B is not a nuclear weapons test platform-cum-orbital strike system.