Philip Bono, a retired Douglas Aircraft Company engineer, died recently. What does this have to do with DC-X? Like Willy Ley, who died a month before the first Moon landing, Bono was a visionary and space pioneer who didn't live to see his ideas take flight. Phil Bono can justifiably be described as the father of the modern SSTO. He was the first to combine the ideas of reusable space launch vehicles with vertical takeoff and landing into a series of concepts that just might have been buildable with the technology of the time. His ideas were largely ignored by the aerospace establishment of the sixties and seventies, but a book he wrote (Frontiers Of Space, with Ken Gatland of the British Interplanetary Society) was responsible for inspiring a generation of launch vehicle engineers who kept his dream alive into the nineties. Sometime next month, Phil Bono's dream will finally fly.
DC-X is a low-speed flight regime testbed for a proposed reusable rocket- powered Single Stage To Orbit transport, McDonnell-Douglas Aerospace's "Delta Clipper". DC-X is intended to prove out rocket-powered vertical takeoff, nose-first lifting-body to tail-first flight transition, and tail-first landing. It is also intended to prove out both rapid turnaround of a reusable rocket by a minimal ground support crew, and rapid low-cost development of an advanced aerospace X-vehicle type engineering testbed by a small highly-motivated engineering team.
DC-X stands 40 feet tall, is 13 feet across the base, masses 22,300 lbs empty and 41,630 lbs fully fuelled, and is powered by four 13,500 lb thrust Pratt & Whitney RL-10-a5 liquid oxygen/liquid hydrogen rocket motors, each able to gimbal +- 8 degrees. The RL-10-a5 is a special version of the RL-10-a designed for wide throttling range (30% to 100%) and sea-level operation.
The single DC-X vehicle was officially rolled out of its construction hangar at MDA's Huntington Beach CA plant at the start of April, then trucked out to White Sands, New Mexico for ground and then flight tests. Ground testing is underway, and flight testing should start in July.
As of Friday, June 11th, DC-X has undergone two additional ground test engine firings during the week since our last report, for a total of seven firings.
On Tuesday, June 8th, DC-X's engines were fired for 28 seconds. You may recall that last week's report included the information that a second firing attempt on Thursday June 3rd (scrubbed due to weather) had been aimed at a duration of fifty seconds. It seems reasonable to assume that Tuesday's firing was also aimed at fifty seconds but was cut short due to some sort of glitch or anomaly. No further information available on this at the moment.
If they did see a problem Tuesday, it was fixed three days later. On Friday, June 11th, DC-X's engines were fired for 50+ seconds, presumably running up to the planned 80% throttle setting (Aviation Week 6/7/93 p. 38), enough for a fully-fuelled liftoff.
According to an MDA spokesperson, one more static engine firing is planned for this coming week, with an additional firing possible if there are any gaps in the test data that need filling. After that, the DC-X team will be packing up and moving from the White Sands Test Facility across a fair chunk of desert to the White Sands Missile Range.
First official DC-X flight (there will likely be short "stability test" hops done beforehand) still looks like happening in July, 3-4 weeks after the move to WSMR begins.
The current DC-X program is funded through flight test and data analysis this fall, and ends after that. There is an ongoing effort to get the US Congress to fund a three-year followon program, variously known as DC-Xb and SX-2 (Space Experimental 2). This would likely be a suborbital vehicle powered by 8 RL-10-a5 engines, capable of reaching mach 6 and 100 miles altitude, built with orbital-weight tanks and structure and orbital grade heat-shielding.
The SX-2 program goal will be to demonstrate all remaining technology needed to build a reusable single-stage-to-orbit vehicle. Once SX-2 has been tested, all that should be necessary to produce a functioning reusable SSTO is to scale up the SX-2 structures and install new larger rocket engines.
Proposed FY '94 funding for SX-2 startup is $75 million. The money would come out of the $3.8 billion BMDO budget already pretty much agreed on for the coming year. Total SX-2 program cost over the next three years is currently estimated at $450 million.
SX-2 would start out under BMDO (formerly SDIO), so support from members of the House and Senate Armed Services Committees (HASC and SASC) is vital.
Lining up support in the House has gone well; all the key committee leaders are at least aware of DC-X Followon, and most seem to be favorably disposed. Representatives Ron Dellums (D, CA, HASC Chair) and Pat Schroeder (D, CO, HASC Research & Technology Subcommittee Chair) could still use some encouragement. Representative John Murtha (D, PA, House Appropriations Committee, Defense Subcommittee Chair) seems favorably disposed already.
Dellums phone 202 225-2661, fax 202 225-9817, 2136 RHOB, Washington DC 20515 Schroeder phone 202 225-4431, fax 202 225-5842, 2208 RHOB, Washington DC 20515
The main effort should shift to the Senate now, specifically to the analagous Senate committee leaders over the next few weeks. Senators to contact are:
-- Senator James Exon (D, NE), Chairman of the SASC Subcommittee on Nuclear
Deterrence, Arms Control, & Defense Intelligence ("Nuke" Subcommittee)
- phone 202 224-4224, fax 202 224-5213, US Senate SH528, Washington DC 20510.
-- Senator Jeff Bingaman (D, NM), Chairman of the SASC Subcommittee on
Defense Technology, Acquisition, & Industrial Base ("DT" Subcommittee).
- phone 202 224-5521, fax 202 224-1810, US Senate SH524, Washington DC 20510.
-- Senator Daniel Inouye (D, HI), Chairman of the Senate Appropriations
Committee's Defense Subcommittee ("Def").
- phone 202 224-3934, fax 202 224-6747, US Senate SH722, Washington DC 20510.
Contacting these Senators' Republican counterparts would also be useful. These are:
-- Senator Trent Lott (R, MS), ranking Republican member of "Nuke". - phone 202 224-6253, fax 202 224-2262, US Senate SR487, Washington DC 20510. -- Senator Joseph Lieberman (R, CT), ranking Republican member of "DT". - phone 202 224-4041, fax 202 224-9750, US Senate SH502, Washington DC 20510. -- Senator Ted Stevens (R, AK), ranking Republican member of "Def" - phone 202 224-3004, fax 202 224-2354, US Senate SH522, Washington DC 20510.
Keep phone calls brief, polite, and to the point - tell whoever answers that you're calling to let them know you support $75 million in funding for a followon to BMDO's Single Stage Rocket Technology ("SSRT") program, and if you feel like it, throw in your favorite reason why this would be a good thing. If the person who answers wants to know more, answer their questions as best you can, otherwise thank them and ring off.
Letters too should should be brief, polite, and to the point, though you can go into a bit more detail as to why a DC-X followon is the neatest thing since sliced bread and good for the country too. Keep it under a page and state your basic point at the start.
Don't overdo it, but in general try to know who you're contacting and emphasize benefits likely to appeal to them.
Henry Vanderbilt
Executive Director, Space Access Society
hvanderbilt@bix.com
602 431-9283 voice/fax
-- Permission granted to redistribute the full and unaltered text of this
-- piece, including the copyright and this notice. All other rights
-- reserved. In other words, intact crossposting is strongly encouraged.